Writing for a Real World 2005-2006: a multidisciplinary anthology by USF students

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Writing for a Real World
2005 - 2006
a multidisciplinary anthology by usf students
Published by the University of San Francisco
Program in Rhetoric and Composition
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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS AND GRATITUDE 4
WRITING ACROSS THE DISCIPLINES 6
HONORABLE MENTION 9
Essays
SILENCING OUR OWN: HETEROSEXISM AND HOMOPHOBIA IN THE
AFRICAN-AMERICAN COMMUNITY
Jamila Sinlao 12
THE RHETORICAL QUESTION AND ANTICIPATING THE COUNTERARGUMENT
IN “THE SERMON ON THE MOUNT”
J. Renee Grelecki 30
SPORTS AND GENDER IDEOLOGY: A TROJAN HORSE IN AMERICAN
SOCIETY
Elizabeth Looney 36
DOMESTIC VIOLENCE IN LESBIAN PARTNERSHIPS: DISPELLING THE MYTHS
Cassidy Condit 51
THE EFFECT OF TECHNOLOGY ON THE ACHIEVEMENT OF STUDENTS
Yen T. Nguyen 72
AT WAR WITH THEMSELVES
Andrew Rutherfurd 83
DECONSTRUCTING THE FACTORIES: THE SOCIETAL IMPACT OF
OUTSOURCING
Robert Johnson 92
THE POWER OF INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY: THE FUTURE OF THE
DIGITAL DIVIDE IN LATIN AMERICA
Allison Domicone 102
Table of Contents
Writing for a Real World
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DO NOT PROCRASTINATE, DO NOT PANIC: RESOURCE CONFLICT IN THE
21ST CENTURY
Travis Sharp 116
DIALOGUES OF HEAD AND HEART: THE PARADOXES OF JEFFERSON AND
ROUSSEAU
Elizabeth Greenwood 130
STIMULANT MEDICATIONS AND UNIVERSITIES: A REVIEW OF THE
LITERATURE
Rebecca Lam 142
PROCREATION CONDITIONS AS REHABILITATION: ARE COURT MANDATED
RESTRICTIONS ON REPRODUCTION A VIOLATION OF HUMAN RIGHTS?
Shayne Mason 150
THE DISTINCTION IN A NAME
Leila Raphael 160
RHETORIC AS A COUNTERPART TO FAITH: AN ANALYSIS OF JESUS’
“SERMON ON THE MOUNT”
Julienne Nucum 174
Science, Technical and Business Writing
THE EFFECTIVENESS OF PSYCHOTHERAPY WITH FOSTER CHILDREN
Alex Garber 181
THE EFFECTS OF TYPE OF COMPARATIVE TERM AND LEARNING
DEVELOPMENT ON SPATIAL AND NON-SPATIAL COMPREHENSION
Alice Albrecht 200
A TRANSMISSION ELECTRON MICROSCOPY STUDY OF RATTUS NORWEGICUS
HEART MUSCLE TISSUE
Lisa Cun 209
University of San Francisco
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Acknowledgments and Gratitude
Our fourth annual issue of Writing for a Real World
continues to showcase excellent undergraduate writing and
celebrate outstanding undergraduate instruction at the
University of San Francisco. Our special anthology offers two
distinct sections: the first devoted to remarkable examples of the
traditional academic essay; the second is a forum for excellent
models of scientific, business and technical writing. Preceding
these essays and reports are introductions from the writers and
their teachers. Overall, the commentaries and introductions help
elucidate the intentions behind the assignments and give insight
into the responses of the students.
This issue marks the beginning of two new features. Our
Honorable Mention section now provides more information related
to the name of the course and the instructors for whom the papers
were written. Additionally, the Program in Rhetoric and
Composition announces the first annual Fr. Urban Grassi, S.J.
Award for Eloquentia Perfecta, an award given to the entry that
earned the highest rating among our journal referees. The award is
named after USF’s (then Saint Ignatius College) first professor of
English and Elocution, Fr. Urban Grassi, S.J. Our inaugural winner
is Jamila Sinlao for Silencing Our Own: Heterosexism and
Homophobia in the African-American Community, an essay written
for Professor Nicole Raeburn’s U.S. Inequalities and Social Justice
course. We congratulate Jamila for this outstanding
accomplishment.
All published papers were chosen from a rich variety of
disciplines, such as Biology, Communication Studies, English,
Politics, Psychology, Rhetoric and Composition, and Sociology.
Choosing the winning entries is a reading-intensive, day-long task
that requires the purely voluntary efforts of already busy USF
faculty and staff. Our judges reviewed carefully 110 submissions
(from which the students’ names had been removed), and every
submission was read by at least two readers, and every winning
submission had to pass the review of at least four readers. For
performing this task with unfailing grace and patience, we humbly
Writing for a Real World
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University of San Francisco
thank the superb efforts of our volunteer readers: Brian Komei
Dempster, David Holler, Devon Christina Holmes, Saera R. Khan,
Kara J. Knafelc, Theodore Matula, Mark Meritt, Lorrie Ranck,
Sara Solloway, and Freddie Wiant.
Continuing a project like WRW requires the selfless efforts of
many people, and we acknowledge the contributions and skills of
those who continue to support this project. As always, we are
deeply grateful to Jennifer Turpin, Dean of the College of Arts and
Sciences, and Dean Rader, Associate Dean of Arts and Humanities,
College of Arts and Sciences, for their generous financial support
and remarkable commitment to reinvigorating undergraduate
writing at USF. A large debt, as well, goes to Freddie Wiant,
Coordinator of the Program in Rhetoric and Composition, for her
tireless support and energy. Our gratitude extends to David Holler
for designing our cover and publication committee members, Brian
Komei Dempster, Devon Christina Holmes, and Mark Meritt, for
shepherding another edition of this anthology and for providing
timely and astute editorial support. Without the support of
everyone, this publication of WRW would be unthinkable.
Our program assistant, Theresa Newman, and our publication
assistant, Kathryn Cantrell, deserve special mention for helping us
in ways too numerous to describe. This publication marks the
departure of Kathryn, who leaves us for the hallowed halls of
Hastings College of the Law. We wish her well. Thanks to John
Pinelli and Norma Washington for paying the bills and to Johnnie
Johnson Hafernik, Chair of Communication Studies, for her long-standing
encouragement of this project.
Finally, our deepest gratitude is reserved for those many
students who challenged themselves and submitted their papers.
The competition was stiff, and, as our Honorable Mention list
illustrates, we received many more commendable essays and
reports than we were able to publish. Congratulations to those who
earned honorable mention—we hope to hear from you again. And,
of course, congratulations to this year’s winners, two of whom
repeat from last year. Our newest authors bravely enter the realm
of published authors writing for a real world.
This journal is dedicated to them.
David Ryan
Editor
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Writing Across
In Acknowledgments and Gratitude, we describe the
process by which this journal is put together. Many people
coming together to create an academic anthology is a
special though not an unusual undertaking. In the process of
creating this journal, however, many compelling things
happen.
When students submit their papers, we encounter student
work which we wouldn’t otherwise. Normally, when students
write essays, these papers—this knowledge—remain between
the student and teacher. Certainly, both are free to keep this
knowledge between themselves, but this kind of exclusivity
prevents others from understanding the kind of learning that
happens in “other classes.”
Writing for a Real World
Most teachers would profess to either not knowing or only
vaguely understanding what happens in other classes—because
they are understandably focused on their own disciplines.
However, a liberal arts education often basis its claims on faculty
working together to broaden the field of inquiry by creating new
paths for their scholarship, teaching and learning. Quite often,
these new paths cross well-established disciplinary boundaries.
In this spirit, students and teachers must understand that they are
free to share their exclusive work with the rest of us. When
teachers and students share their work with the larger university,
they are creating a broader world in which a liberal arts education
truly thrives. Creating a university that strongly emphasizes a
liberal arts education means we must be rightly oriented toward
encountering the work of others—particularly those in other
disciplines—in order to understand what kind of learning is taking
place.
WRW allows the reader to see student work from different
disciplines, and the broad forum that this journal provides allows
us to better understand how writing functions as a heuristic in
biology, communications, English, politics, psychology, sociology,
and the other disciplines represented in this and past issues.
Although USF has no official “writing across the disciplines”
curriculum, the various submissions to this journal suggest that a
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University of San Francisco
the Disciplines
form of writing across the disciplines has developed
organically at USF.
Encountering student work in WRW also raises some
important interdisciplinary questions. For instance, to what
extent is writing used in “non-writing” classes? Do “non-writing”
faculty teach writing when they require it? At the
moment, we must profess to not knowing the answers to these
questions. But what we do know is that the entries we receive
affirm some longly-held but closely-guarded suspicions that
good writing happens outside of the presence of the “writing
faculty” and that good work happens outside of our own
classes.
This kind of learning tends to lessen the academic response
of not knowing what happens in other classes. Because, in a
broader sense, when we read student work that we ordinarily
wouldn’t, we discover that teachers inhabit a common epistemic
paradigm in which writing plays an important role. Affirming this
common pedagogical interest is important because it can free us to
broaden our inquiries beyond our own disciplines to better
understand the relationship between writing and learning. Once we
better understand this relationship, we can begin to explore how
writing instruction beyond first year writing courses can be best
supported. One way to support the writing instruction that occurs
outside of first year writing is to formalize and normatize a Writing
Across the Disciplines curriculum.
Fundamentally, bringing teaching and writing into dialogue
with our lives as students and teachers—regardless of major and
discipline—has fundamental value to the growth of our university.
Developing a better understanding of what happens in other classes
and acknowledging the importance of writing to learning can help
free ourselves to create a university that better relates to us all.
David Ryan
Assistant Professor
Rhetoric and Composition
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Writing for a Real World
2005 - 2006
Editor
David Ryan
Publication Assistant
Kathryn Cantrell
Publication Committee
Brian Komei Dempster
David Holler
Devon Christina Holmes
Mark Meritt
Cover Art
David Holler
Journal Referees
Saera R. Khan, Department of Psychology
Kara Knafelc, Rhetoric and Composition
Theodore Matula, Rhetoric and Composition
Lorrie Ranck, Office of Living-Learning Communities
Sara Solloway, Office of Student Academic Services
Freddie Wiant, Rhetoric and Composition
with Brian Komei Dempster, David Holler,
Devon Christina Holmes, Mark Meritt and David Ryan
Program in Rhetoric and Composition
on the web at www.usfca.edu/rhetcomp/journal/
Writing for a Real World
University of San Francisco
Cowell Hall, 4th Floor
2130 Fulton Street
SF, CA 94117
Writing for a Real World
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Honorable Mention
Kathryn Cantrell
The Enemy Within
and
Writ of Certiori
both written for the Davies Forum: Race, Violence and Law
Ronald Sundstrom
Department of Philosophy
Elizabeth Greenwood
Writing the Space:
Foucault and Latin America
written for Post-Modern Critics: Michel Foucault
Jeffrey Paris
Department of Philosophy
Robert Johnson
Corporate Darwinism: a Cost-Benefit Analysis of Wal-Mart
written for Written Communication II
Brian Komei Dempster
Rhetoric and Composition
Kevin Keefe
“From a Native Daughter”
and
The Authentic Experience
both written for Written Communication II
Mark Meritt
Rhetoric and Composition
Marisa Keller
Religion and Sexuality in the Film, Latter Days
written for Gender, Sexuality and Theater
Peter Novak
Performing Arts
University of San Francisco
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Elia Lopez
Global Warning: Climate Change and the World
written for Oral and Written Communication II
Fredel Wiant
Rhetoric and Composition
Shayne Mason
The Dangers of Confining Your Spiritual Development
in the Workplace
written for Academic Writing at USF
Devon Christina Holmes
Rhetoric and Composition
Sarah M. Shane
Blue Gold: A Look at the Ethics of Water Privatization
Around the World
written for Written Communication II
Brian Komei Dempster
Rhetoric and Composition
Jamila Sinlao
Ecofeminism and the Catholic Church
written for Environmental Sociology
Stephen Zavestoski
Department of Sociology
and
The First Council of Nicean
written for Religion and Culture in Late Antiquity
Martin A. Claussen
Department of History, St. Ignatius Institute
and
War: A Feminist Point of View
written for Sociology of Peace and War
Scott McElwain
Department of Politics
Honorable Mention
Writing for a Real World
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Agnes Tan
Changing Times
written for Written Communication II
Brian Komei Dempster
Rhetoric and Composition
Aaron J. White
The Chinese Banking Industry: Monetary Potential or Money Pit?
written for East Asian Civilizations
Uldis Kruze
Department of History
Honorable Mention
University of San Francisco
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Writer’s Comment: My U.S. Inequalities and Social Justice course
took me on a semester-long journey that explored numerous forms
of oppression that exist within American society, oppressions that
overlap and intersect and reinforce one another to create a stratified
and hierarchal world. As a woman of color, however, one concept
that I found to be most disturbing was that of single-identity
politics, movements that advance the success of a so-called
minority group but ignore the needs and voices of those
marginalized within the group. I wrote this paper in recognition of
LGBT people of color, specifically those within the African-
American community. Using Patricia Hill Collins’ matrix of
domination, I searched to find the roots of homophobia among
Black Americans. Although the complexities of this issue cannot
be fully encompassed within the limits of a research paper, I
believe I succeeded in offering a general overview of the beliefs,
practices, and attitudes that continue to silence and imprison
countless people within our society.
— Jamila Sinlao
Silencing Our Own: Homophobia and
Heterosexism in the African-American
Community
Jamila Sinlao
Instructor’s Comment: The students in my U.S. Inequalities and
Social Justice course, an upper-division sociology requirement,
write a research paper on a topic of their own choosing related to
race, class, gender, and/or sexuality. After reviewing the scholarly
literature, the students provide a sociological analysis by applying
what Black feminist scholars have called intersectional theory. This
theory attempts to understand how people’s lives are shaped by
interlocking systems of inequality and how domination operates in
multiple domains of power. Skillfully applying this theory, Jamila
Sinlao offers a critical analysis of homophobia in the Black
community and concludes by proposing strategies of resistance.
— Nicole Raeburn, Department of Sociology
Winner of the Fr. Urban Grassi, S.J. Prize
for Eloquentia Perfecta
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I. Introduction: The Research Question and Its Significance
The African-American community has long been characterized
as one of resistance and endurance, persevering in the face of
centuries of institutionalized enslavement, legalized segregation,
systemic racism and countless social, political, economic and
interpersonal barriers. To be born black in the United States places
one at a distinct disadvantage for America is not the mythical “land
of opportunity,” the land running with milk and honey, opening its
arms to the huddled masses of poor and underprivileged, but rather
a country deeply divided on the basis of race, class, gender and
sexuality. The very structure of the United States was formed for
the benefit of the white, male, landowning elites who wielded both
economic and political power, thus birthing a strict, formidable
hierarchy based in part on class, in part on gender and sexuality,
but, as theorists Omi and Winant would argue, largely on race
(1990). We continue to live and grapple with this hierarchy today,
particularly within the Black community. Although the Civil
Rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s won integral rights and
liberties for African Americans, the victory came at the cost of
suppressing the cries of those marginalized and oppressed on
multiple levels within the community, particularly women and
lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people of color. It
is this systemic silencing of LGBT people of color that we turn our
attention to. As Coretta Scott King stated, “Homophobia is still a
great problem throughout America, but in the African American
community it is even more threatening” (as cited in Lewis
2003:59-60). Much as King argued, homophobia and its
counterpart, heterosexism, is a strong sentiment among Blacks, one
that has manifested itself in many forms throughout the past
decades. Bayard Rustin, the civil rights activist and strategist, was
excluded from the 1963 March on Washington out of fear that
public knowledge of his sexuality would cast the entire movement
in a negative light (Bennett and Battle 2001). Writer and thinker
Audre Lorde wrote much about the oppression she faced from
those of her own race because she was a lesbian. Rustin, Lorde,
and countless other LGBT people of color have been “sacrificed on
the altar of heteronormativity” (2001:58), casting them as the
invisible, the unseen. LGBT people of color are expected to remain
Silencing Our Own: Homophobia and Heterosexism . . .
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Jamila Sinlao
in the closet or risk the disapproval, censure, and even
abandonment of those closest to them. In recent times, the Black
community and its leadership, particularly within the Black church,
have been sharply criticized for its outspoken opposition to issues
surrounding the LGBT community, often articulated through
incendiary and hate-filled rhetoric. The question, then, must be
asked: What are the main causes of homophobia within the Black
community? This paper will seek to examine these connections
through the framework of Patricia Hill Collins’ matrix of
domination, a powerful and essential tool for understanding the
complex and intricate nature of oppression. It is imperative that a
discussion of this nature be undertaken because LGBT people of
color have suffered in silence for far too long. Enforced conformity
to the heterosexual norm not only harms LGBTs, but crucially
impacts the entire African American community through dividing
families, encouraging unsafe sexual behavior, reinforcing
intolerant and oppressive ideology, and perpetuating the myths of
ideal masculinity and femininity.
My interest in posing this research question has been fueled by
the readings we have done regarding gender, homophobia, systems
of oppression, controlling images and hegemonic thought. These
include R.W. Connell’s “Hegemonic Masculinity and Emphasized
Femininity;” Suzanne Pharr’s “Homophobia and Heterosexism;”
and Patricia Hill Collins’ Black Feminist Thought, as well as her
second book, Black Sexual Politics. These readings offer a
valuable overview of the nature of homophobia and heterosexist
thought in the United States, demonstrating the power of
hegemonic belief and showing how these socially constructed
ideas are very real in their consequences. However, they only
provide an overview of the issue. These works neglect to
recognize the nature of homophobia in the Black community,
which has been noted to take a unique form. A more in-depth
study, then, must be undertaken in order to reach a deeper
understanding of this worrisome dynamic.
II. Literature Review, Analysis, and Relation to the Matrix of
Domination
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In order to understand the roots of homophobia among
African-Americans, it is necessary to keep in mind the way
different domains of power interact in order to oppress and
subjugate not only individuals, but entire groups of people. Collins
describes in length what she has termed the matrix of domination,
four intersecting and interacting domains of power that, in effect,
cage those who do not fit the socially acceptable definition of
normality. These domains are structural, disciplinary, hegemonic
and interpersonal; each domain influences and reinforces the others
and, unless challenged, perpetuates overall subjugation and
discrimination. (2000).
The Power of Family and Church: The Structural Domain
The structural domain, Collins explains, demonstrates how
social institutions are organized to reinforce subordination and
oppression over time. One important emphasis of the structural
domain is placed upon how these macro-level institutions are
interlocking, working in conjunction to keep minority groups
marginalized (2000). Two of the most powerful social institutions
in the structural domain are the family and religion. These two
institutions serve key roles in the socialization process, instilling
society’s most important beliefs, rules, practices and regulations in
children. Among African-Americans, these institutions have, over
time, also developed into the support systems necessary to resist
and survive the overwhelming odds that have been pitted against
them. However, because of their power and strength, they can also
have a more restraining function, effectively restricting its
members to very specific roles and painfully punishing those who
step out of line and seek to defy the established order.
The Black family structure is one that has been the subject of
much controversy and debate, both in the realm of scholarly
research as well as that of public policy. In their article, “We Are
Family: Embracing our Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender
(LGBT) Family Members,” scholars and researchers Juan Battle,
Cathy J. Cohen, Angelique Harris and Beth E. Richie take a
comprehensive view on the history of research on the Black
family. They point to E. Franklin Frazier as being the first to
complete a full-scale, sociological study of the black family,
Silencing Our Own: Homophobia and Heterosexism . . .
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Jamila Sinlao
studying the role of the family in the socialization of race relations.
Frazier argued that, due to slavery, enforced segregation and other
systems of marginalization, the black family evolved into a
matriarchal structure, one that was pathological and contributed to
high occurrences of casual sex and marriage instability (2003).
This practice of, in a sense, demonizing not only the black family
as the source of society’s ills but especially black women, is one
that has been perpetuated into modern-day society. Researchers
who have attempted to combat these negative theories, however,
have done so by either challenging the matriarchal model through
demonstrating the existence of nuclear African-American families
or by explaining the Black family structure’s non-normative
behavior as both a cultural evolution and as an asset. Although
Black feminist scholars have pointed out the need to challenge the
assumption that the “normal” White family structure is better than
that of African-Americans, Battle, Cohen, Harris and Richie argue
for the need to challenge the bias of heterosexual, nuclear families
as a whole. They point to the structural domain of power as
reinforcing this heteronormative bias, saying, “By
[heteronormative], we mean those… larger political and economic
institutions that declare and support heterosexuality and
heterosexual relationships as fundamental and ‘natural’ within
society” (96). The dearth of research and study of LGBT families
of color is startling, and has contributed to the entrenched
assumptions of the heterosexual nuclear family.
It is important to note, however, that it is not only due to the
neglect of those outside of the African American community that
has served to, in effect, erase LGBT people of color from their
rightful place within the family structure, but because of
homophobia inside the community as well. Even for the few
researchers who have dared to tackle studies on LGBT members of
Black families, collecting data and convincing other scholars to
contribute has been an uphill battle. There is a fear among Blacks
and Black LGBTs in particular that revealing the existence of
homosexuality as well as homophobia within the community will
add yet another strike against an already oppressed group of
people. In addition, there is a fear among LGBT scholars of color
that speaking out about their sexuality will endanger their chances
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for promotion and tenure, as well as imperil their relationships
with friends and family.
This anxiety of alienation from the community is not an
outlandish one, for it has been demonstrated in a number of studies
that the Black community has less tolerance for LGBTs than do
Whites. In “Black-White Differences In Attitudes Towards
Homosexuality and Gay Rights,” researcher Gregory B. Lewis
uses responses from about 7,000 Blacks and 43,000 Whites from
31 surveys to gain a greater picture of the racial differences in
attitudes towards homosexuality, as well as to paint a more
comprehensive picture of the roots of such beliefs. His study finds
that Blacks are more homophobic than Whites, but also specifies
that “African Americans attracted to their same sex tend to face
more disapproval from their families and straight friends than do
similar whites… Blacks also face greater difficulty in finding
alternative sources of acceptance and support: they are less likely
than whites to be socially involved in a lesbian or gay community,
and many experience racism in interactions with white LGBs”
(75). Lewis’ findings add increasing weight to the argument that
points to the institution of the family as one that contributes
heavily to the preponderance of homophobic attitudes among
African Americans. Religion, as we will see, couples with the
family structure to create even an even stronger reinforcement of
these beliefs.
The Black church has historically functioned as the pillar and
foundation of the African American community. Its influence has
not waned or lessened over the years. Sociologist James E.
Blackwell, the author of the influential The Black Community:
Diversity and Unity, has written extensively on the powerful role
of the church for Black Americans. As he notes,
There is still a tendency for the black community to look
to the church for a sense of direction, for psychological
support and coping strategies for dealing with persistent
racial prejudice, discrimination, and social stress
encountered in everyday life. The black church remains
an institution that instills racial pride in the achievement
of the individual. It creates a sense of collective
Silencing Our Own: Homophobia and Heterosexism . . .
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Jamila Sinlao
achievement from the accomplishments of other blacks.
It continues to be a place in which, irrespective of one’s
station of life, a person can be treated with dignity and
respect for one’s own individuality and be made to feel…
“like somebody.” (1991:206)
The black church, according to Blackwell, is an institution that
provides guidance and cultural capital to the African American
community, as well as both emotional and spiritual support. When
the issue of homosexuality is raised, it becomes clear that the
church’s “respect for one’s own individuality” is limited to
heterosexuals. Blackwell acknowledges this double-standard when
describing the church’s tepid response to the AIDS, pointing out
that its denial of the epidemic is rooted in the belief that
homosexuality is a sin. Despite the years that have passed and the
movements of some individual churches to provide services for the
HIV/AIDS positive in their communities, Blackwell describes the
church’s current position as ambivalent at best (208). Battle and
Bennett take this view of the church’s position on homosexuality a
step further, stating that “the church’s attitude towards sexuality
becomes a unique and uniquely oppressive vessel for limiting the
acknowledgement and openness of LGBT members of African
American families, further reinforcing a heteronormative model of
life” (2001:58). The question of the role of religious belief in
predicting hostility to the LGBT community, particularly among
African-Americans, was also addressed in Lewis’ study of Black
attitudes towards homosexuality, where he found that over one-third
of respondents still felt as though AIDS was God’s
punishment for immoral sexual behavior. The power and role of
religion is one that echoes loudly in the disciplinary domain.
Surveillance From the Pulpit: The Disciplinary Domain
The disciplinary domain is one that works to carry out the rules
and regulations laid down by the structural institutions. It
functions through the use of surveillance, which is increasingly
occurring in the form of bureaucratic organization, and other
means that help to manage relations of power. Within the social
institution of religion, there exist a number of individual churches,
as well as influential people, who serve as examples of the
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disciplinary domain. The heterosexist and homophobic beliefs
found within the overall religious structure of the Black
fundamentalist church are reproduced through the words and
actions of a number of prominent Black ministers function to keep
LGBT members of the African American community silenced and
closeted. Anecdotes and tales of provocative and inflammatory
sermons preaching against the “sins” of homosexuality are
widespread and common. One prime example comes from
Reverend Willie F. Wilson.
Willie F. Wilson is a national figure in the Black community.
As the executive director of the Millions More Movement, the ten
year anniversary commemoration of Louis Farrakhan’s 1995
Million Man March, Wilson is the pastor of Union Temple Baptist
Church in Washington, D.C. While he helped to initiate “Huggin’
HIV/AIDS Ministry,” a faith-based program designed to serve
those of the community living with HIV/AIDS, church nine years
ago, he caused a public outcry in July 2005 when he delivered
“You’ve Got to Fight to be Free,” a virulently homophobic sermon
regarding an “epidemic” of lesbianism that, in his reasoning, is
spreading like wildfire and threatening the state of the Black
family. “We live in a time when our brothers have been so put
down, can’t get a job, lot of the sisters making more money than
brothers,” Wilson states. “And it’s creating problems in families.
That’s one of the reasons our families [are] breaking up. And
that’s one of the reasons many of our women are becoming
lesbians.” Wilson’s words are more than just inaccurate and
incorrect reflections of the Black family, but approach the
contemptible level of lesbian-baiting. His statements also reflect
the central arguments of heterosexism and patriarchy, particularly
as addressed by Suzanne Pharr. As she writes, “A lesbian is
perceived as a threat to the nuclear family, to male dominance and
control, to the very heart of sexism” (2000:304). It is clear that it
is this structure that Wilson is so anxious to protect and maintain,
and to do so, he uses women and LGBT people of color as his
scapegoats, demonizing them as the roots of societal problems, in
the same way that so many right-wing conservatives have done
since the rise of the New Right.
Silencing Our Own: Homophobia and Heterosexism . . .
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Jamila Sinlao
Faced with intense and fervent opposition and criticism from
gay rights groups throughout the country, Wilson later offered a
statement in which he explained his position. This statement,
however, is not an apology; it merely serves to restate his
assertions of a plague of lesbianism that is sweeping D.C. area
schools. Although he admits that his words were “intemperate,” he
defends his remarks by stating that not only were they said “within
the confines” of his church, but that he was describing an issue of
utmost importance for young girls and the Black family as a whole.
He further justifies his claims by invoking “sagacious admonitions
of our elders who told us ‘what goes on in the family, stays in the
family,” a key argument in forcing LGBT people of color to remain
in the closet. He closes with a call for the Black community to
focus “not on what divides us but on what unites us, not on our
differences but on our similarities,” an appeal that is frighteningly
reminiscent of how women and LGBTs were sidelined during the
Civil Rights movement.
For such words of intolerance and bigotry to come from the
mouth of a Black minister, particularly one as high-ranking and
well known as Wilson, is an alarming occurrence, particularly
when we consider the far-reaching extent of a minister’s authority
and influence over countless matters in the lives of his or her
congregation. As noted within the structural domain, religion
provides African Americans with a necessary foundation and
support system for life. Because of this, there are many LGBTs
who would rather silently pass for straight and endure the hate-filled
sermons and homilies than detach themselves from their
spiritual communities. In the article, “Gays and God: Hostility
Rules Among Black Congregations,” journalist John Blake looks at
this very dynamic. “Despite the abuse,” Blake writes, “many gays
remain part of the mainstream Black church. They discover that
they can’t leave their friends and family and their church’s fervent
worship style. So some live a double life, posing as devoted family
men on Sunday, sneaking around, cheating on their wives the rest
of the week” (1998: A19). The “double life” that Blake is referring
to has been everywhere in the media for the past few years as the
phenomenon known as the “Down Low” or DL. His words serve
to further illustrate the control and sway ministers, preachers, and
WRW - 21
individual church communities can have on trapping LGBT people
of color in lives without truth, dignity, or worth. However, there is
yet another domain that plays a definitive role in creating the
framework within which homophobia can flourish and grow: the
hegemonic domain.
Gender, Heterosexism and the Politics of Black Sexuality: The
Hegemonic Domain
The domain of hegemony is possibly one of the most pervasive
and difficult to combat of the four because it is interwoven into the
very fabric of our society. It influences our culture through
shaping and forming ideologies and thought in such a way that
they eventually become seen as commonsense. Hegemony also
impacts social structure by manipulating social hierarchy and
stratification. It depends on a balance of coercion and consent;
more often than not, however, it is maintained through consent.
This domain serves to justify the practices of the structural and
disciplinary domains of power, and links both the institutions and
their practices with social interaction and the interpersonal domain
(Collins 2000). In issues surrounding homophobia, the hegemonic
domain is apparent in the socially accepted beliefs surrounding
gender, especially in regards to masculinity and the roles assigned
to men and women. In reading just a few of the comments Wilson
made regarding lesbians and Black women in general, we can see
the power and influence of hegemonic thought. In addition to
Pharr’s work on sexism and homophobia, it is important to take
into account the works of R.W. Connell’s “Hegemonic Masculinity
and Emphasized Femininity,” as well as Patricia Hill Collins’
Black Sexual Politics.
Connell’s writings on masculinity and femininity provide much
of the basis of scholarship on gender theory. Although his study of
emphasized femininity is lacking in its intersectional analysis, the
descriptions of hegemonic masculinity are beneficial and
constructive to note. In the same way that Audre Lorde put forth
the idea of the “mythical norm,” the “white, thin, male, young,
heterosexual, Christian, and financially secure” ideal who holds all
the power within American society (1984:16), so does Connell
look at the socially constructed model of “ideal” manhood.
Silencing Our Own: Homophobia and Heterosexism . . .
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Jamila Sinlao
Hegemonic masculinity is Connell’s equivalent of the mythical
norm; this successful, strong, rational thinker is at the top of the
social hierarchy and dominates the rest of society. Occupying the
lower rungs of this structure are the conservative masculinities,
followed by the subordinated/alternative masculinities.
Conservative masculinities describe white, working class men who
still benefit from the gains of patriarchy, white skin privilege, and
heterosexual privilege, but are limited due to class and economic
status. It is the realm of the subordinated masculinity, however,
that proves especially interesting when considering how LGBTs
are perceived among the Black community. Subordinated
masculinities include men of color and gay men, who are
marginalized on the basis of race and sexuality. With that said, for
those who are both men of color and gay, the battle grows
exponentially more difficult.
When considering the consequences of Black men who are
forced to fight against these ideas surrounding masculinity, Collins
provides important insight and perspective. She explores the
shared history between heterosexism and racism in Black Sexual
Politics, as well as looks at the unique nature of homophobia
among Black Americans, thus expanding the intersectional view.
Collins reminds her readers that homosexuality and racism have
been characterized as mutually exclusive; in this way, it has been
the accepted belief “that all Black people are heterosexual and that
all LGBT people are White” (2005:88). This has been done, she
argues, through the perpetuation of the ideology of Black
promiscuity and the “whitening” of homosexuality. It is in the
intersection of both of these pathological ideologies that we can
see the roots of hegemonic thought back to the structural and
disciplinary domains noted above. The Black church, it has been
noted, sought to fight controlling images of Black promiscuity
through promoting an ethic of respectability and encouraging its
congregations to conform to the accepted middle class,
heterosexual nuclear family structure. For this reason, the church
has historically called for strict stratification in terms of gender,
promoting roles that would conform to the system of patriarchy.
Out of this move to embrace heterosexuality, the Black community
left behind those who identified as LGBT. It soon became the
WRW - 23
prevailing assumption that any Blacks who did come out as LGBT
were somehow less “authentically” Black then their heterosexual
peers. These hegemonic ideologies become extremely important
when it comes to trying to understand and analyze the
interpersonal domain.
Men on the DL: The Interpersonal Domain
The fourth and final domain deals with interpersonal
relationships. Through viewing everyday relationships, it is
possible to see how the effects of the structural, disciplinary and
hegemonic domains influence and shape the most simple and basic
of interactions. In terms of homophobia within the Black
community, the interpersonal domain can be examined through an
analysis of the phenomenon of men on the so-called “down low,”
or DL, the popular term for men who sleep with men (MSM). The
DL demonstrates the power of interpersonal relationships in
maintaining the system of heterosexism and homophobia, and also
points to the strong influences of hegemonic thought on what it
means to be Black and LGBT. Two authors have contributed
greatly to the dialogue surrounding the issue of the DL: J.L. King
who is credited as being one of the first to address the down-low,
and Keith Boykin, former special assistant to President Clinton and
current president of the National Black Justice Coalition (NBJC),
who has provided important criticism for the media explosion
surrounding DL. Both men offer valuable insight and assessment
of this critical issue facing our society and provide yet another
opportunity to observe the intersectionality of domains of power.
In recent years, it has become widely recognized the HIV/
AIDS is no longer a disease restricted to White, gay men (King
2004). Statistics have forced our entire society to reevaluate its
beliefs and stereotypes, particularly in light of the CDC estimates
that African Americans now account for over half of all new AIDS
cases in the United States, although they only represent 13 percent
of the population (as cited in King 2004). As King notes in his
book On the Down Low, these numbers have even compelled the
CDC, who have historically grouped gay and bisexual behavior
Silencing Our Own: Homophobia and Heterosexism . . .
WRW - 24
Jamila Sinlao
together, to take a closer look at the dynamics of the Black
community. As King argues, the occurrence of men sleeping with
men (MSM), combined with these same men having unprotected
sex with women, has contributed greatly to the spike in the number
of women who are infected with HIV/AIDS. One of the key
components to the DL is the tendency for these men to identify as
heterosexual. A 2000 CDC study of 8,780 HIV positive men who
were infected through having unprotected sex with other men
showed that 25% of African American men identified as
heterosexual, as opposed to 6% of White men. This behavior,
however, is strongly linked with heterosexism and the pervasive
need to cling to the images of masculinity. Even when on the down
low, they maintain an exactingly male, hyper-macho image that
distances them from any stereotypes of gay men as “feminine” or
sissy. “DL men cannot and will not be associated with anything
that would raise any questions about his sexuality,” King contends.
“…If they tell the truth and say that they are gay or bisexual, they
will be called a ‘fag.’ That’s the worst word you can call a black
man. When a man is called a fag, it hurtsIt strips away your
manhood” (2004:21). Once again, this relates back specifically to
Pharr’s theories on the perpetuation of heterosexism and
homophobia. She writes extensively and persuasively on how
homophobic behavior, including verbal and, in many cases,
physical abuse, is designed to maintain the order of not only
heterosexual privilege but male privilege as well. Men who are on
the down low, then, are clearly perpetuating this system. Through
their consent to the hegemonic ideology that vilifies homosexuality
and calls for strict conformity to masculinity, they, in effect, aid in
their own oppression.
While the DL provides an important place for analyzing the
power of belief and thought in the act of oppression, there are
some who feel that the media hype that has exploded over the issue
is covering up and hiding some of the underlying problems.
Boykin heavily criticizes the current obsession with the DL by
reminding his readers that the issues are deeper and go far beyond
men who lie to their partners. America, he states, “would rather
talk about the down low than talk candidly about racism,
homophobia, and AIDS, and about our collective responsibility to
WRW - 25
find solutions for these problems” (2005:5). The DL, he writes in
his book Beyond the Down Low, has a thousand different meanings
and functions and is not nearly as homogenous as the media or
even King has portrayed it. The images of men on the DL, Boykin
reminds us, have all been Black despite the fact that down low
behavior crosses racial boundaries. He maintains that these
controlling images have become yet another way for White
Americans to pathologize Blacks; for Black women to avoid issues
of personal responsibility; for Black men, particularly those who
are closeted, to declare their masculinity; and for the media to
create and sensationalize yet another gravely important matter. He
speaks, however, to the power of interpersonal relationships in
reinforcing the need for men to remain on the down low, simply
stating, “We create them” (263). Through the stereotypes, the
insults, the condemnation of homosexuality in the church and in
the community and in the media, the public forces men to feel the
need to be on the down low. In this way, Boykin succeeds in
making the DL more than just a personal issue. He reminds his
readers and society as a whole of its responsibilities in creating a
world where homophobia and heterosexism should not be allowed
to exist. Furthermore, he highlights the fact that the oppression of
one group, in fact, oppresses us all.
III. Conclusions: Implications for Social Change and Future
Research
Researching an issue as wide-ranging and encompassing as
homophobia within a community is one that yields an extensive list
of factors and causes. Unfortunately, the African American
population remains one that is understudied and underserved. The
existing readings and research on the dynamics of homophobia
strictly compare Black and White attitudinal differences.
Empirical studies and scholarly writing also specifically focus on
attitudes towards gay men only. Coverage and discussion of the
down low, for example, is clearly gendered, leaving out an entire
population of lesbian, bisexual, and transgender women within the
Black community. The coverage of the DL can also be criticized
for sidelining women in other ways. For example, men are not the
only ones who engage in same sex actions while still maintaining
Silencing Our Own: Homophobia and Heterosexism . . .
WRW - 26
heterosexual relationships. More importantly, however, women
have been framed as helpless victims. King’s advice to women, for
instance, includes urgings to “keep your self-esteem and self-confidence
up by any means necessary, and treat yourself well all
the time” (pg. 65-66). While these are good recommendations for
women, they hardly get at the roots of the problem, as Boykin
pointed out. In order to provide a more comprehensive view and
provide more voices in this discussion, scholars and researchers
need to take into account the writings of Audre Lorde and other
Black feminist thinkers.
The matrix of domination, as we have seen, is a critical one for
studying and understanding the nature of multiple levels of
oppression for a certain group of people. However, while it has
been demonstrated that LGBT people of color have an
overwhelming number of obstacles against them, there are ways
that change can occur.
Within the institution of religion and the Black church, changes
must occur on the level of the leadership and well as within the
congregations. There is a movement to make the church a much
more inclusive, respectful, and tolerant community. Last
December, over one hundred pastors and theologians from all over
the United States met in Atlanta, GA at the First Iconium Baptist
Church to address the issues of homophobia. Regardless of the
individuals’ opinions on issues like gay marriage, the summit,
organized by the National Justice Coalition, was designed to
encourage greater understanding of homosexuality and encourage
acceptance of LGBT members of church congregations (Jarvie
2006). Meetings and summits of this nature are important for they
open the doors to conversations and discussions that have long
been deemed as too controversial to acknowledge or bring up.
Also, because ministers and pastors act has the surveillance or
police force within their churches, patrolling behavior and
encouraging lifestyles and habits that fit the congregation’s moral
code, it is essential that the widespread messages of hatred and
homophobia that are being preached end.
Churches and pastors must be called on to support their words
with actions. Rather than just paying lip service to LGBTs, they
must be actively involved in creating programs and activities that
Jamila Sinlao
WRW - 27
seek to welcome LGBT members as full participants in the church.
Some suggestions listed by Boykin in his book are worthy to note.
Churches would benefit from offering its members safe sex
education, free HIV testing, peer support groups, and non-judgmental
counseling. These actions are crucial, particularly
given the importance and power of the church within the lives of
African Americans.
On a personal level, everyone can work to dismantle the
stereotypes, prejudices, controlling images, and other hegemonic
tools that have been used to marginalize and silence LGBT people.
Collins provides a detailed and critical analysis of the interpersonal
realm of resistance in Black Sexual Politics and calls for Black
men and women to adopt “healthy bodies” through treating the
spiritual, mental, and physical aspects of life as “interactive and
synergistic” (pg. 283), as well as through fighting against the
existing scripts that dictate Black masculinity and femininity. She
also points to the need to overcome the paralyzing nature of denial
and fear that has overtaken the Black community, particularly in
the case of the HIV/AIDS, and to readjust the fundamental
understanding of what the word “community” means. Rather than
seeking to impose only one narrow view of what it means to be
Black, Collins argues that African Americans must fully accept and
support each individual. “Love relationships,” as she puts it,
become the glue for holding Black society together. In this way,
acceptance of LGBT family members becomes significant.
There are countless means by which LGBT people of color can
come together and demand their rights of recognition and respect
from those within the Black community. For marginalized and
minority groups to continue to oppress their own is absolutely
unacceptable; it flies in the face of logic and reasoning. In the end,
it is necessary and essential that they speak out and break the
silence. It is also up to allies and partners of both the LGBT
movement and the civil rights movement to speak out in support of
our brothers and sisters. Silence reinforces the status quo,
reinforces the norm. It prevents not only LGBT people from living
free and open lives, but it also continues to oppress the rest of
society by forcing us to remain in the box of homophobia, the box
Silencing Our Own: Homophobia and Heterosexism . . .
WRW - 28
Jamila Sinlao
of patriarchy, the box of heterosexism. Only in speaking out can
we free ourselves.
References
Battle, Juan, et al. 2003. “We Really Are Family: Embracing Our
Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender (LGBT) Family
Members.” Pp. 93-106 in The State of Black America 2003.
Washington, DC: National Urban League.
Bennett, Michael and Juan Battle. 2001. “‘We Can See Them, But We
Can’t Hear Them’: LGBT Members of African American Families.”
Pp. 53-67 in Queer Families, Queer Politics, edited by Mary
Bernstein and Renate Reimann. New York, NY: Columbia
University Press.
Blackwell, James E. 1991. The Black Community: Diversity and Unity.
3rd Edition. New York, NY: Addison Wesley Publishing Company.
Boykin, Keith. 2005. Beyond the Down Low: Sex, Lies, and Denial in
Black America. New York, NY: Carroll & Graf Publishers.
Collins, Patricia Hill. 2000. Black Feminist Thought. New York, NY:
Routledge.
———. 2005. Black Sexual Politics. New York, NY: Routledge.
Connell, R.W. [1987] 1997. “Hegemonic Masculinity and Emphasized
Femininity.” Pp. 22-25 in Feminist Frontiers IV, edited by Laurel
Richardson, Verta Taylor, and Nancy Whittier. New York: McGraw-
Hill.
King, J.L. 2004. On The Down Low. New York, NY: Broadway Books.
Jarvie, Jenny. 2006. “Black Clergy Tackle Homophobia; A summit put
on by a gay rights group gathers Christian leaders to explore
attitudes toward homosexuality.” Los Angeles Times. Los Angeles,
CA.
WRW - 29
Lewis, Gregory B. 2003. “Black-White Differences in Attitudes
Toward Homosexuality and Gay Rights.” Public Opinion Quarterly.
Chicago, IL. Vol. 67, Iss. 1. pg. 59-79.
Lorde, Audre. [1984] 1996. “Age, Race, Class and Sex: Women
Redefining Difference.” Pp. 114-123 in Sister Outsider: Essays and
Speeches. Freedom, CA: The Crossing Press.
Montgomery, Lori and Hamil R. Harris. 2005. “D.C. Pastor Again
Assails Lesbianism; Web Posting Describes ‘Severe Crisis’ for
Blacks.” The Washington Post. Washington, D.C.
Pharr, Suzanne. [1988] 2000. “Homophobia and Sexism.” Pp. 303-307
in Experiencing Race, Class, and Gender in the United States (3rd
ed.), edited by Virginia Cyrus. Mountain View, CA: Mayfield
Publishing.
Wilson, Willie F. 2005. “You’ve Got to Fight to Be Free.” Found at
<http://www.keithboykin.com/arch/2005_07_18.html>.
Silencing Our Own: Homophobia and Heterosexism . . .
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The Rhetorical Question and Anticipating
the Counterargument in “The Sermon on
the Mount”
J. Renee Grelecki
Writer’s Comment: For Professor Ryan’s Rhetoric and Citizenship,
we were given the option of “presenting a rhetorical analysis of
the Sermon on the Mount” and instructed to deconstruct the text
into its finer rhetorical nuances. Before studying the text, I vaguely
remembered the rhetorical question was peppered sparsely, but
deliberately, throughout the oration. The rhetorical question, when
employed by unseasoned orators or when found in everyday
political speech, often appears unnecessary, if not pompous and
self-serving. When expertly employed as it is in “Sermon on the
Mount,” however, the rhetorical question provides the audience
with moments of self-reflection; the orator removes himself,
allowing the audience to re-evaluate their own beliefs. The
rhetorical question eliminates the barrier between audience and
orator. The audience is not swayed by glitzy rhetorical flourishes
but rather actively participates in a rhetorical exchange.
—J. Renee Grelecki
Instructor’s Comment: A talented writer and gifted thinker, Renee
dives into this famous sermon and resurfaces with an insightful and
complex analysis of how Jesus employed classical rhetorical
practices to help frame his theological oration. The premise of
Rhetoric and Citizenship is to examine the concept of civic virtue
in different moral communities, including faith-based
communities, and understand how rhetoric helps shape this virtue.
In her meditative encounter with the text, Renee employs a
humanistic practice of rhetorical analysis and emerges with a
nuanced understanding of Jesus’ argument for salvation. She
surmises that Jesus used the rhetorical question as a way of
anticipating counterarguments in order to persuade his audience to
let go of longly-held beliefs and adopt new ways of thinking, new
ways of believing, and new ways of living.
—David Ryan, Rhetoric and Composition
WRW - 31
The use of the rhetorical question is frequently associated
with politicians and philosophers in their rudimentary
attempts at creating ethical dilemmas. But if we choose to
unburden the rhetorical question from such unflattering confines,
we find one of its finest displays in Jesus’ oration, “Sermon on the
Mount.” To maintain, or perhaps sway, audience belief, Jesus
employs a multitude of persuasive devices—particularly the
rhetorical question—to validate his authoritative if not divine
message. Jesus uses this carefully placed rhetorical device as a
caveat toward awakening his audience from their spiritual
slumbers to fully actualize their spiritual yearnings.
In his “Sermon on the Mount,” Jesus—understood properly as
synthesis of Man and God—works to achieve unity between the
flaws of Man and the divine truths by which one is ultimately
judged. In this attempt at furthering human understanding of
personal salvation and God, Jesus couples his vibrant message with
an omniscient understanding of Man’s potential for divine
transcendence. While Jesus’ audience believed their fate was
rooted in Original Sin, he assures his audience that transcending
their fated damnation is possible so long as they act rightfully and
in accordance with the will of God. Creating situational support for
acting rightly, Jesus employs the rhetorical question as a mode of
providing ethical accountability by testing and molding pre-existing
audience beliefs. Furthermore, Jesus anticipates the
counter-position to his argument to better structure his position and
preemptively address audience responses. Refuting the common
belief of the day, “Ye shalt love thy neighbor, and hate thine
enemy,” Jesus says,
For if ye love them which love you, what reward have ye? Do
not even the publicans the same? And if ye salute your brethren
only, what do ye more than others? Do not even the publicans
so? Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in
heaven is perfect (Jesus 431).
In this telling passage, Jesus eliminates a common yet
important logical assumption: one’s enemy is not worthy of one’s
love. This belief is true, Jesus argues, if one wishes to be among
The Rhetorical Question and Anticipating the Counterargument . . .
WRW - 32
one’s enemies—if one wishes to live by the similar ethical codes of
those one despises. Jesus uses the rhetorical question, here, to
create an ethical binary—if one does not love one’s enemy, one
becomes one’s enemy. By pitting the unfavorable, human response
of hate against the divine, indiscriminating act of love, Jesus
allows his audience to organically refute their own expected
reactions. Jesus’ empathic understanding of human emotional
response creates solid audience sympathy, one not stemming from
the shaky devotion of clever yet empty ceremonial speeches, but
one rather realized by the innate ethical longings of his audience.
The audience, no matter how accepting to the persuasive
tactics of an oration, is frequently surprised by the personal
skepticism rhetorical questions evoke. The reevaluation of ethics
and beliefs is often not appreciated and, therefore, the questions
posed must be deliberate and its content selective. Where a
question is placed (in the opening line, in the final summation, etc.)
mirrors the rhetorician’s persuasive intent. What should be noted
first, then, is not where the rhetorical question is initially
presented, but rather where it is first not. For instance, “Blessed
be”—the opening anaphoric device in the Beatitudes—is entirely
devoid of rhetorical questions; and its omission, here, is
demonstrative of his persuasive intention. There is no need for
questioning in the opening Beatitudes, as Jesus does not simply
wish to strengthen their pre-existing ethical codes. In these opening
lines, Jesus instills the belief code from which he is speaking: one
that is working to mold audience views, so that they may later be
tested for durability and substance.
Rhetorical questioning is one such test—meant to affirm or
reject one’s preexisting beliefs. Not willing to divide a fragile
unity, Jesus saves his rhetorical needling for the content directly
following the opening Beatitudes. He says,
Ye are the salt of earth: but if the salt have lost his savor, where
with shall it be salted? It is thenceforth good for nothing, but to
be cast out, and to be trodden under foot of men (430).
Interesting, here, is the parallel made between salt and Man. This
parallel is not so much symbolism—often subjective and yielding
J. Renee Grelecki
WRW - 33
to interpretation—as direct comparison. Possessing masterful
control over language and rhetoric, Jesus does not bother with
simple simile (Ye are like the salt of the earth…”). Perhaps
reveling in a divine importance, Jesus eliminates any distinction
between the subjects of his analogy. He has removed human
characteristics such as flaw and sin and asks his audience to
answer this parallel: what is the significance of life (salt) with
goodness (savor)? The counterargument is non-existent, as it
would in Platonic tradition, because Jesus presents an argument
that cannot be refuted. He builds a pillar of ethical unity upon a
foundation he has already laid.
Further complicating and deepening Jesus’ rhetorical stance is
that the rhetorical question, as witnessed in the “Sermon on the
Mount,” presents a false dilemma—false insofar as the dilemma is
unbalanced, naturally leaning towards the favorable, humanitarian
response. The choice the audience will ultimately make—what is
life if not an expression of innate goodness?—is made
independently, though this is not to say unswayed by rhetorical
manipulation of metaphor and context. This persuading of
audience reactions is accomplished by creating ethical binaries.
This strategy—when used ineffectively—is often a last resort
favoring broad generalizations. When employed successfully,
however, binary ethical dilemmas allow for an audience to see the
simplest rationale behind a certain philosophy. Jesus uses this
strategy as he rhetorically proposes, “…what man in there of you,
whom if his son ask bread, will he give him a stone? Or if ask a
fish, will he give him a serpent?” (433). Speaking in metaphor,
here, Jesus constructs an argument that no one can refute. The
dualistic and antithetical imagery—bread and stone, fish and
serpent—presents a simple argument mirroring a greater analogy
of goodness and acting rightly in accordance with God.
Jesus uses the binary situational dilemma to instruct his
audience to create a unified audience ethos: unified in right action,
unified in understanding, unified in faith. From creating a shared
belief, Jesus is successful in relating further divine concerns:
mainly the multiplicity of evil that can be done wrongly in the
name of God. He says,
The Rhetorical Question and Anticipating the Counterargument . . .
WRW - 34
Not every one that saith unto me, “Lord, Lord,” shall enter into
the kingdom of heaven…Many will say to me in that day, “Lord,
Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? And in thy name
have cast out devils? And in thy name done many wonderful
works?” And then I will profess unto them, “I never knew you,
depart from me, ye that work inequity” (434).
In this closing passage, Jesus revisits the rhetorical question, but its
purpose has been altered. The posed questions are illustrative of
both the textual progression and cadence, and the evolving
persuasive intent within “Sermon on the Mount.” The use of the
rhetorical question has manifested itself from Jesus’ anaphoric
metaphors, to human understanding of right living. This is to say,
the rhetorical question begins in the opening passages of “Sermon
on the Mount” to build a collective audience ethos. The above
passage, however, questions Man’s divine intent and the very ethos
that the initial rhetorical questions sought to build. Jesus speaks
ominously, addressing the malleability of his words and that which
can be wrongfully done in his name.
The rhetorical question is employed in “The Sermon on the
Mount” as means of cultivating audience loyalty and strengthening
or reshaping preexisting beliefs in order to illustrate a clearer path
to salvation. Through his use of binary—black and white—
imagery and his tactful use of rhetorical questioning, Jesus creates
a unified audience ethos. This tactic is not meant to forcibly cajole
or knowingly elude. Rather, the rhetorical question allows his
audience to attain an organic devotion—one not wholly based on
the mechanics of clever speech. Through his deliberate placement
of the rhetorical question and his anticipation of the
counterargument, Jesus uses persuasive language to develop a
solemn, holy ethos. From forming this divine, humanitarian ethos,
Jesus is able to test audience loyalties by creating rhetorical
situations and metaphors that aim to instill an audience ethical
unity. Empathetic to the flaws of Man, Jesus employs the rhetorical
question as a means of forming an organic devotion, one based on
a unified audience belief that he possesses ethical and divine truth.
J. Renee Grelecki
WRW - 35
Works Cited
Jesus. “The Sermon on the Mount.” Lend Me Your Ears: Great
Speeches in History. Ed. Wm. Safire. New York: W. W. Norton &
Co., 1997: 430-34.
The Rhetorical Question and Anticipating the Counterargument . . .
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Sports and Gender Ideology:
A Trojan Horse in American Society
Elizabeth Looney
Instructor’s Comment: In Feminism, Gender, and the Body, an
upper-division sociology elective, my students write research
papers on a related topic of their own choosing. After conducting
secondary research, they present major empirical findings and
discuss what they think is the best theoretical framework for
understanding or making sense of those empirical patterns. They
also provide a critical assessment that addresses both the strengths
and weaknesses of the scholarly work in that area. In her paper,
Elizabeth Looney offers a highly insightful analysis of a widely
publicized gang rape by examining the social and cultural factors
that constitute the U.S. as a “rape-prone” society.
— Nicole Raeburn, Department of Sociology
Writer’s Comment: In March of 1989, thirteen teenaged boys lured
their mentally retarded neighbor (of the same age) into a basement
and gang-raped her using series of inanimate wooden objects, as
well as coercing her to perform other sexual acts. While this even
is sickening in and of itself, it was the response of the surrounding
community that shocked me the most: the town of Glen Ridge
rallied around the boys and voiced their unwavering support for
them as they endured the “hardships” of a public trial. As if that
wasn’t enough of a slap in the face to the victim and her family, the
mentally retarded girl was labeled by Glen Ridge as
“promiscuous” and guilty for what happened to her. Written for
Professor Nikki Raeburn’s Feminism, Gender and the Body, this
essay investigates the dominant gender ideologies and present in
American athletic culture and their consequences, and hopes to
exemplify that who we value is, by necessity, a direct indicator of
what we value.
— Elizabeth Looney
WRW - 37
More charges of sexual assault are brought against athletes
than any other profession (Benedict 1998). Athletes at
the professional, collegiate and even high school level as
we will see always seem to be appearing in the media wrapped up
in another scandal of sexual abuse “allegations.” Though sadly
most of these cases never reach the trial stage and even fewer
result in a conviction (much less jail time), the fact that these
charges keep surfacing is a phenomenon not to be overlooked.
Rather, it whispers of the sad lessons we as a society teach to our
athletes about who they are, what they can do, and what will be
done about it. Messages sent from all over tell them they are
important, that men matter and women don’t, and that they are
exempt from social accountability. This leads to overt sexual
aggression by athletes and is the symptomatic manifestation of a
dominant gender ideology that is prevalent everywhere but
permissible in athletics. Using the Glen Ridge high school rape as
a case-in-point, this essay will examine how misogynist gender
ideologies that permeate our society are crystallized in athletic
culture. The actions of our athletes serve well to tell us who we are.
Glen Ridge, New Jersey, was a picture perfect snapshot of
America’s suburban lifestyle. The majority of its inhabitants were
white, upper middle-class families who had moved to the ‘burbs to
raise their children with good old-fashioned American values.
Glen Ridgers were doctors, lawyers and businesspeople, and their
children lived accordingly. Their kids attended the local public
elementary school, participated in recreational and school sports,
and went to church Sunday school on the weekends. From the
outside, the town seemed to be the envy of nearby towns of lesser
affluence. But in March of 1989, the ugly side of American values
would show its face and shock the nation.
On a Thursday afternoon Leslie Faber1, a mentally retarded
teenager and life time resident of Glen Ridge, was outside playing
basketball at a public park. As the story goes, she was approached
by Christopher Archer, a star Glen Ridge football player and heart
throb, and invited down into the basement of his teammates Kevin
and Kyle Scherzer for a “party.” She accompanied Archer to find
that she was the only female among thirteen male high school
athletes. Though she reported feeling uncomfortable, they coaxed
Sports and Gender Ideology: A Trojan Horse in American Society
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Elizabeth Looney
her to sit down and relax; they were telling her that they liked her.
Then, she was asked to perform fellatio on one of the boys while
the others watched. At this point, six of the boys left, and seven
stayed. Before the evening was over Leslie would be raped with a
broom handle and a regulation length baseball bat and then be
asked to leave.
The athletes who raped Leslie Faber were not social deviants
or criminal misfits; at least, they had never been seen or taught to
think of themselves that way. Instead, they were what Bernard
Lefkowitz (1997:20) described as “the pride of Glen Ridge High.”
Kyle Scherzer was captain of the baseball team, and he and his
twin brother Kevin were co-captains of the varsity football team.
High school junior Chris Archer and his brother Paul, a senior,
were both on the football team, and Paul was captain of the
wrestling team. Also present were Bryant Grober, a wrestler,
football player and son of a doctor, Richard Corcoran, Jr., who
played football, wrestled and was the son of the local police chief,
and Peter Quigley, also on the football team (Lefkowitz 1997).
Together, they ruled the school and were officially known as “the
Jocks.” The Jocks were the most popular, rowdy, and sought-after
group of students at Glen Ridge High.
Leslie Faber, on the other hand, was none of those. She had
been diagnosed as mentally retarded at a relatively young age and
retested in 1987 with a measured IQ of 49. As a high school
student, she had the mental capabilities of an eight year old
(Lefkowitz 1997). Leslie attended a special school near Glen Ridge
High for students with developmental difficulties but played sports
on the Glen Ridge High team. Leslie had always been an avid
sports fan and, like everyone else, admired the school’s athletes.
She was described as sweet with a lively, spunky spirit. As a
marked social outcast, she was also notably vying for friends and
approval (Lefkowitz 1997).
Though rumors of the rape began circulating through the
school the day after the event took place, police did not begin
investigating the crime until nearly six weeks later. The
investigation resulted in the arrest of the six Jocks two and a half
months later (Richie Corcoran, the police chief’s son, was arrested
later on). The case did eventually go to trial, and though all four
WRW - 39
athletes indicted were found guilty—three on charges of first
degree sexual assault (a.k.a. rape) on a “mentally defective”
person, and one on charges of conspiracy to commit sexual
assault—they were permitted to walk out of the courtroom on bail,
an unprecedented decision for convicted rapists. It was not until
1997, four years after their conviction, and nine years after the
rape, that Archer and the Scherzer twins were finally sentenced to
jail. Kyle Scherzer received a seven year sentence and was
released in ’99 after two years, while his twin brother Kevin and
Chris Archer received and are serving 15 year sentences (Henley
1999).
So what happened in Glen Ridge? How did the “American
values” parents sought to instill in their children translate into
making rape acceptable behavior among not one but thirteen of the
town’s youngsters? The American values that shaped the boys’
upbringing in Glen Ridge reveal a strong overarching belief: a
powerful gender dynamic that emphasizes the unchallenged
authority of white males and puts women at their service and
disposal. This gender dynamic is not indicative of something
unique about Glen Ridge, New Jersey; rather, it is symptomatic of
the dominant beliefs about gender and privilege that are found in
any American town and epitomized in American athletic culture.
The socialization of boys into the world of sports is popular
practice that happens at all levels of the game. The values are
always the same, their intensity and implications different. From a
young age boys (and girls) in sports are taught that they are
something special, kids exempt from the rules somehow. First, the
social rules that govern their very bodies are different. Athletes are
taught to use their bodies as sources of physical aggression, and the
more aggressive they are the better (Bordo 1999). Aggression wins
in competitive sports, and in a world where winning is all that
matters, success at the game serves as a powerful reinforcer that
aggressive bodies are the most correct and desirable bodies one
should aim for. The sports that the convicted Glen Ridge athletes
had participated in since childhood—football, wrestling—were
high-contact sports wherein the body is used as an accepted vehicle
of aggression towards another person. Though females clearly play
sports as well, they are notably absent (at least at the professional
Sports and Gender Ideology: A Trojan Horse in American Society
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Elizabeth Looney
level) specifically from high-contact sports. Male athletes are
taught that their bodies are the exception. Speaking of the Mike
Tyson rape case and the male athletic body, Bordo (1999:236-237)
writes, “The boxer . . . vestigial repository of primal masculinity, is
a real person who is learning—in the very fibers of his being, his
body—that civilized taboos against violence do not apply to him.”
On this very fundamental level, athletes—specifically male
athletes—learn that they are exempt from the rules.
Of course, not all athletes become rapists, or even necessarily
adopt a demeaning attitude towards women. Like any population,
the majority of its members are “normal.” But like Susan Bordo
tells us in her writing on anorexia, we learn about our culture not
by studying those who are included and healthy, but by studying
those who we consider sick anomalies to the norm. It is in
analyzing those “bad seeds” that we learn the most who we are and
where we come from. The fact that that more sexual charges are
brought against athletes than any other profession speaks not of
athletes as a collective whole as rapists—certainly not. But it does
speak to a certain type of learning that must be going on in athletic
culture which teaches that violence against women is acceptable.
Let us now look at that culture in more detail and see the deeper
meanings carried behind Glen Ridge’s messages to its athletes.
The young (successful) male athlete not only learns who he is
physically but also socially. The child has probably grown up
admiring sports himself and has come to see that professional
sports and athletes are held in high regard in our culture. By
extension, he learns that emulating athletic behavior will gain him,
too, the adoration of adults and peers alike. The first wave of social
messages comes from adults, and the message they send is simple:
you’re special. On the role adults—especially adult men—play in
young male athletes’ lives, Benedict (1998:10) writes:
Recognizing particular abilities in young athletes,
coaches and other authority figures invest unusual
interest in an adolescent’s potential to excel in a sport.
Men will offer verbal encouragement [and] volunteer
time to discuss ways of improving. Such unnatural
adulation from figures of authority conveys a message
WRW - 41
to a maturing teenager that he is uniquely entitled to
preferential treatment that is unavailable to his
nonathletic peers.
To young athletes, time spent with them by coaches is what
salaries are to the pros: the currency which carries the social
message of importance. All children need adults to spend time with
them to know that they are important. Athletic children, especially
gifted ones, receive heaps of it. This is good in that it builds
confidence in a child, but an over-emphasis on sports by adults
easily backfires in two ways: first, it potentially creates a source of
over-confidence in a child as a member of a community and
second, much to its own demise, focusing too narrowly on sports
will stunt the growth of other values that would potentially regulate
anti-values like arrogance. This is precisely what happened in Glen
Ridge.
Glen Ridge lived and breathed athletics and football especially.
Football was a source of community identity and commonality, and
enjoyment of the sport was non-negotiable if one was to be
considered what Lefkowitz (1997:62) calls a “true Ridger.” Long-rooted
in Glen Ridge collective memory were highlights of earlier
generations of Glen Ridge men. One coach, Bill Horey, coached
the high school football team through 22 straight seasons resulting
in 147 wins, 35 losses and 3 ties. Susan Atkins* was a teacher at
Glen Ridge for twenty-four years and is quoted in Lefkowitz’s
(1997:62) book saying, “I had never seen anything like it before.
All the boys in town wanted to be athletes. Football was king and
if you didn’t wear a football uniform you were a nobody.” Football
was the social nucleus of entertainment and community, and as it
was only a boys’ sport, boys enjoyed all the glory. All adults sent
children the same message, which Lefkowitz (1997:64)
summarizes:
The athletes’ progress was certified, formalized, by the
athletic association and the recreation program, year
after year. The sons of the Scherzers, Corcorans,
Archers and Grobers knew they were special because
the town told them so. It was right there in the end-of-season
stats, right there engraved on their trophies.
Sports and Gender Ideology: A Trojan Horse in American Society
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Elizabeth Looney
Adults were effective in sending a message that became engrained
in their children, as any message repeated incessantly will do. The
message was who matters and who doesn’t. In this case it was the
athletic boys that mattered the most and everyone else, especially
the girls, that mattered less. Leslie Faber was the epitome of what
Glen Ridge did not have any valued social space for: a female who
was disabled.
Sports were serious business in Glen Ridge, so serious, in fact,
that there was no room on the social stage for anything besides
sports. Lefkowitz provides an interesting content analysis of the
Glen Ridge High yearbook of 1989—the year all Jocks in the
Leslie Faber case except Chris Archer graduated. The analysis
paints a clear picture of not only the adults’ but peers’ belief in the
importance of athletes and, ironically enough, specifically those
involved in the Faber case. Of the “candid shots” of individual
students that appeared in the yearbook, the yearbook’s editor and
“Jockette” (a term given to girls who swooned over the Jocks) Tara
Timpanaro had the most with 17 photos appearing. Second was
Richie Corcoran, with 12 candid shots. Third was Bryant Grober,
then Peter Quigley with 9 shots, followed by Kyle and Kevin
Scherzer with 8 candid shots each (Lefkowitz 1997:173-74). One
candid shot appeared of the class Valedictorian. In the yearbook,
23 pages were dedicated to athletics, while non-athletic clubs
received a total of six pages, taking up 1/4 page each. Four pages
were dedicated to the cheer-leading squad with 25 members and 2
pages to the school band with 44 members. Without a doubt, Glen
Ridge loved its athletes. Unfortunately, though, Glen Ridge loved
them to the point that it permitted the social belittlement of
everyone else. Someone has to be on the bottom in order for
someone else to be on top.
Status is granted in the professional world by salary, air time
and public celebrity. Some professional sports teams, specifically
in the NFL, are bought and sold for over $200 million dollars, with
star athletes earning salaries of more than $4 million per year
(Benedict 1998:7). Air time of professional sporting events
reaches the outlandish cost of $1 million for a 30 second
commercial during the Super Bowl, and professional athletes,
WRW - 43
Benedict writes, “have become virtually unsurpassed in their
national popularity” (1998:7). The fervent dedication of our mental
and monetary resources to sports is a good indicator of where our
priorities as a culture lie: in able-bodied, aggressive men. But we
need to look very carefully at all of the messages carried by the
current of athletic culture that we find ourselves swept up in.
Athletic culture is a powerful agent of what is at its worst
misogynist gender ideology. From very early on, boys and girls
have traditionally been separated to play on different teams.
Everything in the world separates boys and girls—colors,
bathrooms, lines—but what is always also implied is who’s on top
of the divide and who’s on the bottom. The simple allocation of
resources for boys’ and girls’ team sends a clear message about
who matters. Title IX, which was passed in 1972, states that all
educational programs receiving federal funding cannot
discriminate on the basis of gender, including in athletic and
sporting events. The feminist hope in Title IX was that women and
girls would have more access to resources to sports, which today
they do—before Title IX women were 2% of college athletes
participating in sports, while in 2001 43% of college athletes were
women (Women’s Sports Foundation 2003). Financial spending
does not reflect the same proportion, however. For every one dollar
allocated to female sports, three dollars are allocated to male sports
(Women’s Sports Foundation 2003). Unfortunately, not a huge
effort is being made to recruit girls and women into sports to
bridge the gap—only 32% of college recruitment spending goes
towards recruiting women (Women’s Sports Foundation 2003).
However, as noted by the Feminist Majority Foundation (2005), no
school has ever lost federal funding for not complying with Title
IX stipulations. A serious discrepancy in messages is sent when the
law supports women’s athletics in theory but not in practice. This
sentiment is mirrored in professional sports. In 2005, the salary
cap for men’s teams in the NBA was $49 million; for women’s
teams in the WNBA it was $673,000 (Inside Hoops 2005). The
gender ideologies embodied by professional sports—as reflected
concretely in their salaries—have very real consequences on a
number of levels.
Sports and Gender Ideology: A Trojan Horse in American Society
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Elizabeth Looney
To return to the opening point, athletes as a profession are
charged with more sexual assaults than members of any other
profession. How the leap from salaries to sexual aggression?
Benedict (1998) outlines a few factors. First, he states, athletes are
incrementally relieved of real-life responsibilities as any time off
the field translates into a loss in salary. A wealth of agents,
lawyers, coaches and investors take care of the details of life,
leaving players to face less and less accountability for behavior not
related to their athletic performance. Second, relieved of a good
portion of a normal adult’s responsibilities, athletes are left with
much “leisure time” that is inevitably spent in hotels, bars,
nightclubs and the like. Benedict (1998) simply postulates that to
fill this leisure time, some athletes have sex. There is a steady
stream of available women (what Benedict calls the “groupie”
phenomenon) that are willing to have sex with professional
athletes just because they’re professional athletes. What this leads
to, though, is the idea that all women want to have sex with them.
Professional athletes that take advantage of women have probably
had sex with many willing women as well. All wrapped up in
fantasy lives and excitement, though, they lose sight of reality and
fail to distinguish between the woman who comes back for a glass
of wine only, and the woman who willfully consents to sex.
Professional athletes on trial for sex crimes, their lawyers, the rest
of us and more often than not even jurors will shamelessly accuse
all women of being groupies. Our willingness to do so speaks to a
fundamental and timeless belief that women, all women, are
promiscuous, inviting and therefore guilty.
The stereotype of women as promiscuous is not new. In fact,
it was the exact word used by the boys’ Glen Ridge defense lawyer
to describe Leslie Faber, and he wasn’t alone. Adults and teens all
over the community, when asked by Lefkowitz or other
interviewers about Leslie Faber’s character, consistently replied
that she was a “promiscuous” and “sexually aggressive” girl
(Lefkowitz 1997). In short, they said, “She was asking for it.”
Richie Corcoran (the police chief’s son) had no trouble voicing this
commonly held belief; in an interview with the media after a day
of trial, he exploded in anger (as he had commonly done as a child
when called out by the umps) saying, “She wanted it,” and walked
WRW - 45
away giving the camera the finger (Lefkowitz 1998:231). On trial,
Paul Archer, who was in his early twenties at the time and
acquitted in exchange for his testimony, stated, “She made all the
advances. She was the one who did all the propositioning. She was
the one doing everything. It was all her idea.” What the Jocks and
the rest of Glen Ridge conveniently overlooked, though, was that
Leslie had the IQ of an eight year old and functioned socially at
about the same level. Could anyone really call an eight-year-old’s
behavior promiscuous? Attention seeking, maybe, but
promiscuous implies an overt, intentional gesture at sexuality. To
be intentional about sexuality, one must understand sexuality.
Leslie Faber, as a mentally retarded seventeen- year-old, clearly
did not understand sexuality. The fact that she willfully and
trustingly accompanied thirteen notoriously sexual athletes to a
basement speaks to the fact that she did not fully understand
sexuality.
Some other girls at the high school did behave sexually
towards the athletes, sometimes to the point of performing fellatio
seriatim and in public. Whether or not they were coerced depended
on the situation, Lefkowitz (1998) reported incidences of both.
Although, in a place like Glen Ridge, the notion of free will
becomes highly skewed. The boys often referred to their common
pastime of voyeurism in public, and in print in their yearbook.
Paul Archer, Kevin and Kyle Scherzer all referred to “voyeurs,” or
“my Voy-R with (girl’s name)” in their printed high school
yearbook memoirs, which did receive adult approval to be printed
and distributed to the entire graduating class (Lefkowitz 1998:175-
176). Glen Ridge was comfortable with the boys bragging about
public sex acts and telling the whole world who they were with.
As Lefkowitz painstakingly documented, Glen Ridge did not try to
protect its women, but rather saw them as victims of their own
fault if they got taken advantage of by the Jocks. As we’ve seen
happen with professional athletes and their posse, Glen Ridgers
lost the ability to distinguish between willing and unwilling
participants and, quite frankly, just didn’t care for accusations
brought against their boys. They had a defense ready to write off
any claims of abuse, as they had been doing for years in the New
Jersey suburb (and the professional stadium). This is crystallized in
Sports and Gender Ideology: A Trojan Horse in American Society
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Elizabeth Looney
the fact that they accused a mentally impaired girl of inviting the
sexual advances that led to her rape and all but exonerated the
sound-minded adults who raped her.
So how do we get to this point? How do rational adults
collectively and oftentimes successfully blame a woman for the
rape that happened to her? Our ideas about masculinity and
femininity must be deeply embedded to the point that we could be
so blind; they must be rooted in our very culture. For if they were
specific to athletes, mainstream America looking in would be much
more likely to spot them as something that stood out against the
norm—the way we can see the irregularities of an eccentric cult
that the people inside don’t see as bizarre at all. But the fact that
we love and cherish athletes, give our children toy figurines of
them to play with and think it’s odd to question this is evidence of
the fact that they are not only entertainers to us but also people
who share our values. Athletes embody values of hard work,
discipline, teamwork, endurance and performance. But athletic
culture embodies another set of values that we also find acceptable
and desirable: the values of gender, of what is masculine and what
is feminine; what it means to be a boy, and what it means to be a
girl. Quite simply, masculinity is valued, hard, rough, aggressive
and should go unchallenged. Femininity is not valued, soft (i.e.
softball), polite and catering. Athletic culture—especially at the
high school level on up—epitomizes our ideologies about gender,
and they are the very ideologies that lead to what Peggy Sanday
(1981) calls a “rape-prone society.”
Sanday found that ‘rape-prone societies,’ or places with high
incidences of rape, share common cultural beliefs. A study of 95
tribal societies revealed that rape-prone societies are ones with
high levels of militarism, interpersonal violence, ideologies of
male toughness and distant father-child relationships. Sanday also
reported “rape-free societies,” or cultures with low incidences of
rape. Rape-free societies were found to encourage female
participation, have male involvement in child-rearing and be places
where men spoke about women with respect (Sanday 1981 as cited
in Hood 1992). The overall attitude of men towards women in
Glen Ridge and in the athletic culture of the United States is
congruent with the attitudes towards women found in a rape-prone
WRW - 47
culture. And Sanday’s theory holds up: as we have seen
statistically, athletics is a rape-prone culture. But it’s more than
that; it’s our culture.
Scully and Marolla (1985 as cited in Hood 1992:367) found
that the United States is “the most rape-prone of all modern
societies.” This makes sense; all the pieces of Sanday’s theory are
there. Militarism: the United States is clearly inclined to war.
Again, allocation of funds can be seen as a measure of priority—
about $90 million of the federal budget went to education in 2005,
and over $500 billion went to the Department of Defense (Federal
Budget Spending and the National Debt 2006). American culture,
the law and especially the athletic world do not consistently
encourage female participation. This is evident in the fact stated
earlier that only one third of college recruiting resources go
towards recruiting women, and schools receive no real punishment
for not encouraging women and girls to play more, as was
promised in Title IX (Women’s Sports Foundation 2003). But it is
the discourse around women that is most troubling. In general, and
in athletic cultures specifically, it is based in anything but respect.
Publicly sanctioned references to women (by name) as participants
in acts of voyeurism indicate a discourse about women that is
definitely not based in respect, but rather in them as subservient to
men. Not only that, but as willingly subservient. The Glen Ridge
athletes would probably not have referenced women by name as
participants of sex acts had they though of the women as unwilling,
because they might have understood that that meant rape. Sadly,
the Glen Ridge athletes—because of how they saw themselves,
saw women, and understood the relationship between them—most
likely perceived women, all women, as willing participants in sex
crimes. (Glen Ridge athletes also referred to certain women as
“seals” who would perform [sexually] like a seal performs in a
circus—on queue [Lefkowitz 1997:127-128]). Never to excuse
them, but just to point out: the Glen Ridge boys were just
emulating—albeit in an extremely exaggerated way—what the
structural and cultural messages sent to them about girls were. In
many ways the sports world says, “Go ahead. You won’t get
punished, and we don’t value them, either.” This is the big, fat
message in sports with respect to gender, and one that as we have
Sports and Gender Ideology: A Trojan Horse in American Society
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Elizabeth Looney
seen has very real consequences. Patriarchy-based gender ideology
is the violently successful Greek army that is welcomed through
the city gates of our culture masquerading as the beautiful, strong
Trojan horse of athletics.
Sports, as we have seen, are teeming with examples of lived
gender hierarchies. But it is a mistake to think that these beliefs are
isolated to athletic culture. Certain factors in athletic culture give
rise to the acting of gender beliefs, including the learning of their
body as a tool of aggression, exemption from other social norms
and no accountability, but these would not translate into the rape of
women unless a dominant gender ideology was also present. As
Sanday (1990:192) tells us, “Abusive behavior toward women is
not necessary to male development. Social ideologies, not human
nature, prepare men to abuse women.” The fact that American
society holds athletes in such high prestige means that they are
what we value. In other words, we cannot separate who we value
from what we value. If we value people who publicly degrade and
in the worst case scenario violate women, then we as supportive
bystanders must also value (or at least not challenge) the
degradation and violation of women. The support Glen Ridge
athletes received after the rape of mentally impaired Leslie Faber is
a powerful snapshot of where we as a society stand on issues of
gender and privilege. During the trial, Lefkowitz (1998) writes, the
boys’ side of the courtroom (they were tried together) was packed
full of family, friends, girlfriends, and supporters from Glen Ridge.
There was one woman from the town who sat on Leslie Faber’s
side. Because they were white, because they were wealthy, and
because they were males, the Glen Ridge athletes, like so many
other athletes, were permitted to walk free for nine years after their
crime. The fact that three of the seven boys in the basement did
finally see the inside of a jail cell is almost totally overshadowed
by the deliberation it took to get them there. The fact that the crime
happened and the accused were involved was never deliberated.
The fact that a baseball bat and broomstick were inserted into a
retarded girl’s vagina by three mentally sound young men was not
the question—trial records show that these facts were accepted by
both the prosecution and defense from the beginning. What the real
issue up for debate pertained to was who gets to be right and who
WRW - 49
gets to be wrong. The question presented itself as, “Did they know
that taking advantage of a mentally impaired girl was wrong?”
Clearly, the answer is yes. Yes they did know it was wrong.
Simply, they didn’t care. The very fact that this absurd question
was asked, though, is evident of a deeper unchallenged belief that
they can do no wrong in the first place. What this question really
asks is “Can our boys do any wrong?”
The fact that almost the entire town was more inclined to
blame Leslie for being “promiscuous” than the boys for being
wrong speaks of a highly skewed gender ideology. This ideology,
which must be not just athletes but all of ours, is that white,
privileged men are what is right, and women, including the weak
and disabled, are what is wrong. What was really deliberated at the
Glen Ridge trial, and athletic rape trials everywhere, is “Can our
values be what is wrong?” It is much easier to say that they are not,
because clearly we are all implicated, then, in the rape of Leslie
Faber. Interestingly, we have no trouble convicting Black
rapists—dominant racial ideologies confidently purport that Blacks
embody what is wrong, or negative, or undesirable. But the courts
deliberated for nine years over the possibility that rich White
athletic boys could be wrong (again, the issue was never whether
or not they did it, but whether or not it was legally wrong). We
didn’t want them to be wrong because it would mean the very core
of our American values on privilege and gender—the American
values parents intentionally sought to teach their children—are
flawed. But clearly, they are. The Glen Ridge jocks were never
held accountable for anything other than their performance on the
field, and they ran with it. They took their freedom and ran with it,
all the way ‘till the end of the field.
Endnote
1 The real name of Leslie Faber has not been made public in order to protect her
identity. She has become commonly referred to by the name Leslie Faber,
which Bernard used in his 1996 book on the Glen Ridge rape case, Our Guys.
Names denoted with an asterisk are pseudonyms at the interviewee’s request.
All other names are factual.
Sports and Gender Ideology: A Trojan Horse in American Society
WRW - 50
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Bordo, Susan. 1999. The Male Body. New York, NY: Farrar, Straus and
Giroux.
Federal Budget Spending. 2006. http://www.federalbudget.com.
Accessed on 1 May 2006.
Feminist Majority Foundation. 2005. http://www.feminist.org/sports/
titleIXa.asp. Accessed on 1 May 2006.
Henley, Robert. 1999. “Three Men are Jailed in Glen Ridge Sexual
Assault Case.” The New York Times, July 1, 1997.
www.nytimes.com. Accessed on 1 May 2006.
Hood, Jane. 1992. “Let’s Get a Girl: Male Bonding Rituals in America.”
Published in Kimmel and Messner (1992) Men’s Lives. New York,
NY: Macmillian Publishing Company.
Inside Hoops. 2005. http://www.insidehoops.com. Accessed on 1 May
2006.
Lefkowitz, Bernard. 1997. Our Guys: The Glen Ridge Rape and the
Secret Life of the Perfect Suburb. Berkely, CA: University of
California Press.
Sanday, Peggy Reeves. 1990. Fraternity Gang Rape: Sex, Brotherhood
and Privilege on Campus. New York, NY: New York University
Press.
———. 1981. “The Socio-Cultural Context of Rape: A Cross-Cultural
Study.” Journal of Social Issues 37:5-27.
Scully, D., and J. Marolla. 1985. “Riding the Bull at Gilly’s”: Convicted
Rapists Describe the Rewards of Rape.” Social Problems 32:251-
263.
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foundation.org>. Accessed on 1 May 2006.
Elizabeth Looney
WRW - 51
Writer’s Comment: Domestic violence is a social injustice that I
have been dedicated to fighting for some time now, so when I
received my writing assignment from Professor Raeburn, which
instructed us to critically examine a social injustice using
components of the sociological imagination, I knew that I wanted
to focus on domestic violence. Limiting my focus to domestic
violence in lesbian partnerships, however, was not something I had
planned ahead of time. Like so many people I have talked to since
writing this paper, I was blinded by the myths surrounding same-gender
domestic violence and did not realize that it was even an
issue. As I delved further into my research, I discovered that it is in
fact a grave reality for far too many women. This paper has
become so much more to me than just an assignment. I feel that
this paper has allowed me to give a voice to the problem of
domestic violence in lesbian partnerships, and to make visible an
issue that has been invisible for far too long.
— Cassidy Condit
Domestic Violence in Lesbian
Partnerships: Dispelling the Myths
Cassidy Condit
Instructor’s Comment: For my Diversity of American Families
class, a lower-division sociology elective and Core Cultural
Diversity course, students write a research paper on a topic of their
own choosing related to the diversity of family experiences in the
U.S., whether based on race, class, gender, and/or sexuality.
Applying what C. Wright Mills called a “sociological
imagination,” students use this approach to (1) explain how
historical, cultural, and social structural forces shape the
experiences of diverse families; and/or (2) critically question
dominant (mis)understandings of “the family” and related policy
implications. Cassidy Condit’s essay provides an outstanding
sociological analysis of the experiences of lesbian survivors of
domestic violence. Notably, this paper also won the 2006 Paper
Prize from the Gender and Sexualities Studies Minor.
— Nicole Raeburn, Department of Sociology
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Cassidy Condit
Domestic violence is a grave social problem in the United
States, afflicting both private and public sectors of life. In
recent years, advocates, researchers, and policymakers
have shown necessary concern for this problem and have worked
to implement programs, shelters, statutes, and laws that protect
survivors of domestic violence. Unfortunately, much of this work
has benefited only heterosexual women, while purposefully
excluding many battered lesbians. Why is that? What myths,
beliefs, and stereotypes surround same-sex domestic violence1 in
lesbian partnerships, and what historical, cultural, and political
factors have helped to perpetuate and reify them?
Although increasing attention has been paid to domestic
violence between women and men by researchers, activists, and
policymakers alike since the 1970s, domestic violence between
same-gender partners has historically received little to no
recognition as a social problem, with studies on the issue first
emerging in the early 1990s (McClennen 2005). And despite a
growing awareness of the subject, the paucity of research and
literature remains extremely problematic not only for survivors of
same-gender domestic violence seeking support and safety, but
also for advocates and activists who would greatly benefit from
empirical studies that could help dispel myths and stereotypes
attributed to same-gender domestic violence. According to Joan
McClennen (2005), because they rely on empirical data, “[P]olicies
and programs are lacking in their ability to provide protection and
services for same-gender individuals experiencing domestic
violence, thus creating further social injustices to this oppressed
population” (p. 149). Therefore, it is important not only to bring
awareness to the problem of same-gender domestic violence, but
also to conduct research in order to challenge the myths and
stereotypes that are used to stigmatize, oppress, and effectively
silence survivors of same-gender domestic violence. However,
before research findings can be applied, it is important to qualify
these myths and stereotypes, as well as to understand the historical,
cultural, and political forces that have perpetuated and essentially
reified these false beliefs. The sociological imagination can be
utilized in order to best understand how historical, cultural, and
WRW - 53
political forces shape and uphold the myths surrounding domestic
violence in lesbian partnerships.
The sociological imagination, a term coined by sociologist C.
Wright Mills in 1959, is a quest for an understanding of the social
world, and, as Evan Willis (1996) explains it, is made up of four
main components – the historical, cultural, structural, and critical
(p. 55). The historical component examines changes over time and
explores how these changes impact individuals, groups, and
institutions. According to Willis (1996), “The past is studied not
for its own sake but for what it can tell us about the shape that our
current society takes” (p. 58). In other words, one must study the
past in order to understand and appreciate the shape of the present
society. The cultural component of the sociological imagination is
comprised of the learned or symbolic aspects of society, including
ideologies, discourse, norms, values, language, and customs. The
cultural component serves to reveal “the range and diversity in
human societies” (Willis 1996, p. 64) and to challenge
ethnocentrism by showing that it is difficult to clearly define what
is normal. When applying this component it is important to take
into account and to understand cultural relativity; in other words, it
is necessary to recognize that cultures are not arranged in a
hierarchy and thus should not be judged ethnocentrically, based on
the “norms” of one’s own culture. A third component of the
sociological imagination is the structural component. This
component examines how society is organized and looks at
relatively stable patterns of behaviors. An important aspect of this
part of the sociological imagination is understanding how social
stratification systems not only separate groups but also place
hierarchies upon them, which creates inequalities in access to
society’s wealth, opportunities, power, and resources. Finally, the
critical component looks to challenge the myths in (mostly
conservative) ideologies, or belief systems that justify particular
structural or social arrangements. This component requires that one
engage in systematic doubt, question the legitimacy and validity of
a statement, and then try to narrow down the degree of doubt as
much as possible (Willis 1996). It also requires one to question
who benefits and who loses (or who benefits least) from a specific
Domestic Violence in Lesbian Partnerships: Dispelling the Myths
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Cassidy Condit
social arrangement, in addition to challenging the status quo and
envisioning alternative futures.
Applying the sociological imagination to the issue of domestic
violence in lesbian partnerships provides a more thorough analysis
and a more complete understanding of this problem. In particular,
applying the historical, cultural, and structural components of the
sociological imagination not only brings to light the myths that
surround the issue of same-sex domestic violence but also suggests
how political and social factors have historically helped to
perpetuate and reify these myths. The historical and cultural
components will be used to qualify these myths and beliefs, while
the structural component will explore the laws and statutes that
uphold these myths, falsehoods which prevent domestic violence
agencies from providing adequate support for survivors of same-sex
battering and abuse. These myths also reinforce institutional
discrimination against same-sex partners, which is reflected in
laws and statutes that purposefully exclude or otherwise ignore the
special needs of same-sex domestic violence. First, however, it is
necessary to qualify what exactly is meant by domestic violence.
Domestic violence is a pattern of coercive and aggressive
behaviors used by one partner, the perpetrator or batterer, in an
attempt to exercise control over another person’s thoughts, beliefs,
and behavior where there exists, or at one time existed, a loving,
intimate, dependent relationship between the perpetrator and the
survivor (Aulivola 2004; Peterman and Dixon 2003). While
domestic violence is most often equated with physical battering, it
is not limited to only this form of violence. In addition to physical
abuse, domestic violence encompasses emotional, verbal,
psychological, and sexual abuse, coercion, and manipulation, as
well as the financial dependence, intimidation, and social isolation
of the survivor by the perpetrator (Aulivola 2004; McClennen
2005; Peterman and Dixon 2003; Wilson 1997). As stated by Linda
Peterman and Charlotte Dixon (2003), it is “a major social and
health problem in the United States…and 25% to 30% of all U.S.
women are at risk of domestic violence during their lifetime” (p.
40). While domestic violence has traditionally been considered in
the context of heterosexual relationships, the National Coalition
Against Domestic Violence suggests that domestic violence occurs
WRW - 55
in approximately 25% to 33% of all same-sex partnerships; in
other words, the prevalence rates of domestic violence do not differ
greatly between heterosexual and same-sex partnerships
(McClennen 2005; Peterman and Dixon 2003; Potoczniak, Mourot,
Crosbie-Burnett, and Potoczniak 2003). Although domestic
violence in heterosexual relationships has been receiving more
attention in recent years, domestic violence in lesbian relationships
is burdened with pervasive myths and stereotypes that prevent it
from receiving equal recognition.
One of the most pervasive myths afflicting lesbians who
experience domestic violence is that women are not violent, that
their passive natures, as constructed by a masculine hegemony,
preclude the possibility that one woman could inflict violence upon
another. Traditional gender roles define women as nurturing, docile
individuals who are expected to be submissive and compliant. The
societal constructions of femininity do not allow for women to be
violent or aggressive; therefore domestic violence cannot exist in
lesbian partnerships (Potoczniak et al. 2003). Domestic violence is
often explained with a feminist theory which, according to
McClennen (2005), asserts a “cultural endowment of domination
of men over women” (p. 150). Lori Girshick (2002) agrees, stating,
“The basic explanatory concepts for both domestic violence and
rape are power and domination, but they are applied in an analysis
of how heterosexual men oppress heterosexual women under
patriarchy” (p. 16). This is troublesome because this theoretical
framework caters to heterosexist gender roles and expectations and
effectively minimizes domestic violence in lesbian partnerships.
In order to more fully understand how this patriarchal theory of
domestic violence came to exist in the United States, it is important
to look at its historical emergence and development. K. J. Wilson
(1997) claims, “Violence against women has its roots in a
patriarchal system dating back thousands of years” (p. 252). While
gender roles may have been segregated and women subordinated
even in preliterate societies, it has been argued that the laws of
ancient Babylonian society provide the first written evidence of the
enslavement, ownership, and subjugation of women by men
(Wilson 1997). This trend of enslavement by gender, which more
or less formally began in the archaic states in the ancient Near
Domestic Violence in Lesbian Partnerships: Dispelling the Myths
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Cassidy Condit
East, gained momentum with the rise of Christianity and the idea
of original sin in the fourth century, continued with “femicidal
mania of the witch craze” (Wilson 1997, p. 260) in the Middle
Ages, especially the sixteenth through the eighteenth centuries, and
was later brought by European settlers to American colonies. Early
feminists in the United States in the late eighteenth and nineteenth
centuries began to challenge the system of patriarchy which for
thousands of years had oppressed women and essentially condoned
domestic violence (Wilson 1997).
But it was not until the advent of the second wave of feminism
in the United States in the late 1960s and early 1970s that the
battered women’s movement against domestic violence began to
gain momentum and to explicitly condemn violence against
women. According to Gregory Merrill (1996), “When looking for
the root of domestic violence, feminists saw cultural misogyny and
sexism” (p. 11). Traditional gender role socialization in a
patriarchal society whose dominant culture encourages its men to
be “brave, dominant, aggressive, and strong” has taught men that it
is acceptable “to use violence and that they are expected to be in
charge of ‘their’ women and children” (Merrill 1996, p. 11).
Women, on the other hand, are encouraged to be passive and
deferential. Feminism fought to give a voice to all the women who
had previously been silenced by gender-based oppression and by
the violence committed against them by their male partners. The
feminist movement helped women recognize they were not alone,
and that domestic violence was no longer a private issue that was
to remain isolated from the public domain but rather a political
issue, a crime committed by men against women. When domestic
violence was first being organized into a political issue, feminists
had to rely on dichotomized gender roles, separating men as the
perpetrators and women as the recipients of the abuse, as this
allowed women to band together in solidarity against the
patriarchal society that had kept them isolated, repressed, silenced.
The battered women’s movement, led in no small part by
feminists, historically employed domestic violence as a tool to
combat sexism, which although successful for the heterosexual
domestic violence movement, is a technique that purposefully and
WRW - 57
systematically refuses to validate same-sex domestic violence,
according to Pam Elliott (1996). Support and intervention
programs have been made increasingly available to battered
heterosexual women. Advocates have fought to criminalize
domestic violence and have worked with policymakers to establish
laws which punish heterosexual offenders and protect heterosexual
survivors. However, battered lesbians have been just as effectively
ignored, their experiences pushed to the side, unable to be
explained by the largely popular feminist sociopolitical theory.
The feminist sociopolitical theory, with its framework shaped
largely by a system of patriarchy, has garnered much attention and,
according to Merrill (1996), has “become the most commonly
accepted explanation for domestic violence among academicians,
the domestic violence movement, and lay people” (p. 12). In other
words, this gender-based theory is widely accepted because
gender-role socialization is quite pervasive and largely taken for
granted in the United States; thus it seems logical for many people
that it is the dominant, aggressive man who batters or otherwise
abuses the nurturing, passive, deferential woman. Elliott (1996)
supports Merrill’s statement, claiming that “the basic philosophy of
the battered women’s movement [is] that patriarchy and sexism are
responsible for all violence” (p. 6).
Because this theory has been so widely accepted in the United
States, it is quite difficult to recognize, and therefore explain,
domestic violence in lesbian partnerships using this theoretical
framework. In order to reconcile this conflict, which posits that
women have been socialized in such a way as to make it
incompatible that they are violent or aggressive, two separate but
related myths emerge. The first is that woman-to-woman violence
is not a problem, because the possibility of a woman acting
violently or aggressively towards another woman (or a man, for
that matter) contradicts the hegemonic gender expectations for
women; therefore a woman cannot really hurt another woman
(Elliott 1996). This not only minimizes same-sex domestic
violence but also ignores the many other facets of domestic
violence, such as psychological manipulation, emotional abuse,
physical isolation, and sexual coercion. But because patriarchy and
sexism are seen by many as the roots of domestic violence, and
Domestic Violence in Lesbian Partnerships: Dispelling the Myths
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Cassidy Condit
because this theory has been widely successful in garnering
societal recognition of domestic violence and providing support for
women in violent heterosexual relationships, it has been easier, and
thus preferable, to ignore rather than address the cases of domestic
violence that cannot be explained with the dominant feminist
theory.
The second myth that emerges from this heterosexist
theoretical framework is that lesbian relationships are violent only
when there are clearly identifiable “butch” and “femme” roles. In
the United States, as with many patriarchal societies, violence
tends to be linked with masculinity; therefore, the stronger, more
“masculine” butch partner is assumed to be the primary aggressor
simply because she looks like the “man” in the relationship
(Balsam and Szymanski 2005; Girshick 2002; Potoczniak et al.
2003; Wilson 1997; Younglove, Kerr, and Vitello 2002).
Historically (the 1930s through the 1950s), bars were one of the
few public places that lesbians could gather and socialize, and it
was in this woman-identified bar culture that “butch/femme roles
became entrenched as the stereotypical manner of lesbian
presentation” (Girshick 2002, p. 51). If a lesbian partnership does
not visibly adhere to these “roles,” it is very likely that domestic
violence will not be recognized by members of the larger society,
most of whom have been socialized to internalize notions of
heterosexism. Heterosexism, as defined by Girshick (2002), is the
belief that only heterosexuality is normal and natural; therefore, it
is the only acceptable sexual standard. It assumes that the world is
heterosexual, and that everyone aligns to one of two binaries,
female or male. It is shaped by patriarchal male privilege, and it
indicates ignorance regarding not only same-sex domestic violence
but also homosexuality in general. This is evidenced in the
aforementioned myth, that the more “masculine” lesbian partner
who identifies as butch abuses her “weaker” femme partner. This is
problematic, not only because it minimizes the idea that domestic
violence is about power and control and reaffirms the abusive man/
battered woman dichotomy, but also because it essentially denies
the existence of lesbian relationships that do not necessarily adopt
a butch/femme framework. This effectively keeps lesbian survivors
WRW - 59
of domestic violence silenced, invisible, and unable to access
safety networks and support services.
Another myth that prevents survivors of same-sex domestic
violence from seeking help is the myth of mutual battering. This
concept was developed in the late 1970s as a way to explain the
phenomenon of a heterosexual woman using physical violence
against her male perpetrator (Potoczniak et al. 2003). It introduced
the idea that “both males and females use physical and emotional
aggression to resolve conflict…The roles of victim and perpetrator
are blurred, non-existent, or fluid” (Marrujo and Kreger 1996, p.
24). Just as the roles of victim and perpetrator were blurred and
uncertain, so too were the historical meanings of mutual battering
and self-defense. Mutual battering has since come to be
distinguished from self-defense by defining the former as the
initiation of physical aggression in retaliation and anger while the
latter is defined as physical aggression used to prevent further
injury (Marrujo and Kreger 1996). However, in lesbian
relationships, when both partners engage in violence, they are
often considered to be equally at fault. Self-defense is rarely taken
into account; it is often assumed that because they are both women,
the battering must truly be mutual, and the degree of violence
inflicted and the injury sustained must truly be equal. Failing to
distinguish between perpetrator and survivor, and failing to
recognize that one partner may be engaging in self-defense in order
to prevent herself from further harm minimizes the severity of
same-sex domestic violence and deems it unworthy of legal
intervention.
Rather than explore the power dynamics in lesbian
partnerships in order to understand the context in which violence
occurs, when a lesbian defends herself against her partner, police
often dismiss it as mutual combat and therefore, not deserving of
their time and services (Potoczniak et al. 2003; Younglove et al.
2002). Minimizing the violence in lesbian relationships as nothing
more than mutual battering silences many survivors of domestic
violence by refusing to legitimize their experiences. In a largely
homophobic society, battered lesbians may see the world outside
the queer community as an unfriendly world, unwelcoming,
unsympathetic, and unwilling to provide help.
Domestic Violence in Lesbian Partnerships: Dispelling the Myths
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Cassidy Condit
While rejection by the larger society deters many battered
lesbians from breaking their silence and seeking help, the myth of
a “lesbian utopia” is at times a more powerful barrier than any of
the aforementioned myths. As Girshick (2002) suggests, “The
mythology of women’s nonviolence and lesbian egalitarianism has
proven to be a formidable block…[S]urvivors of this abuse
internalize the myths and want to believe that they are safe from
other women” (p. 49). In fact, it is this lesbian utopia that has
provided lesbians with support and safety from a hostile,
misogynistic, homophobic society. It is a safe haven for women to
exist. It legitimizes their sense of self and experiences. It serves as
a site of resistance against a society which has pushed lesbian
women to its margins, invalidated their experiences, denied their
existence. Unfortunately, this same utopia silences survivors,
prevents them from acknowledging that someone within this haven
could be the perpetrator of violence. Because many lesbians
internalize this myth, they are hesitant, perhaps even unable, to
admit that their partner uses violence in their relationship.
The myth of a lesbian utopia pervades the lesbian community,
even those who have not experienced violence in their own
partnerships. The lesbian community may even encourage
survivors of same-sex domestic violence to remain silent in order
to maintain the illusion of an egalitarian, idyllic community of
lesbian women. Wilson (1997) states, “Denial, minimization, and
rationalization about abuse has been the community’s way to
protect itself from a society that is looking for reasons to condemn
lesbians…as sick and perverted” (p. 118). According to Elliott
(1996), “[T]he community sought to keep this issue quiet due to
shame and the reluctance to provide ammunition for the
homophobic majority who would use such problems to
demonstrate inferiority” (p. 6). The fear of rejection from both the
lesbian community as well as rejection by the larger society is a
major factor in maintaining the invisibility of same-sex domestic
violence.
Now that some of the myths surrounding same-sex domestic
violence have been explored in their historical and cultural
contexts, it is important to examine how these historical and
cultural factors shape a third component of the sociological
WRW - 61
imagination, the structural component. More specifically, it is
necessary to look at how heterosexism and homonegativity have
shaped societal structures, in particular certain laws and statutes
that either explicitly exclude or implicitly overlook the lesbian
community. For example, as Younglove et al. (2002) report, until it
was amended on November 30, 1994, California’s 1977 domestic
violence statute stated that “any person who willfully inflicts
[violence] on a person of the opposite sex…resulting in a traumatic
condition, is guilty of a felony” [p. 760 (italics added)]. This
domestic violence law, which purposefully excludes survivors of
same-sex domestic violence, seems to violate the Fourteenth
Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause, as do many statutes with
more ambiguous wording (Girshick 2002; Younglove et al. 2002).
Aulivola (2004) asserts, “[M]any states’ domestic violence laws do
not explicitly protect victims of abuse in gay and lesbian
relationships because these couples do not fall within the definition
of family that is laid out in the statutes” (p. 163). The ambiguous
wording of many states’ domestic violence laws often requires
judicial interpretation; however, until the court has more clearly
defined a state’s domestic violence statutes, the ambiguous
wording more or less entitles local law enforcement and other legal
authorities to use their discretion on a case-by-case basis
(Potoczniak et al. 2003). This can be highly problematic, and even
dangerous, especially if law enforcement officers respond to same-sex
domestic violence complaints with preconceived beliefs that
have been shaped by society’s homophobia and that at times lead
the officers to dismiss a case as not serious enough to warrant an
arrest. Conversely, these beliefs may lead law enforcement officers
to arrest both partners in cases where it is not clearly discernable
which partner is the “butch” and therefore, according to the myth,
the obvious abuser.
Aulivola (2004) further reports that because many states do not
offer civil protection orders (also commonly referred to as
restraining orders) in cases of same-sex domestic violence, one of
the only alternatives for survivors is to seek a criminal court order
of protection. This order of protection can only be granted once the
perpetrator has been arrested and the court has concluded that the
survivor is at risk for further harm and abuse (Aulivola 2004).
Domestic Violence in Lesbian Partnerships: Dispelling the Myths
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Cassidy Condit
While criminal court proceedings are many times plea-bargained
before ever reaching a courtroom, the cases that do reach court are
often lengthy, drawn-out processes, and may put the abused partner
at increased risk for further injury while she waits on the
impending criminal order (Aulivola 2004). In family court, on the
other hand, in cases where there is an “immediate and present
danger of violence,” a temporary emergency order may be issued
and upheld until a full hearing can occur (Aulivola 2004, p. 5).
Although all 50 states, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico
provide civil protection orders, it is much more difficult for a
lesbian survivor of same-sex domestic violence to obtain one than
it is for a heterosexual woman who has been victimized by a man
with whom she is currently or was formerly involved (Aulivola
2004; Peterman and Dixon 2003; Potoczniak et al. 2003). This
fact, coupled with the knowledge that criminal court proceedings
are often long, complicated ordeals, deters many lesbian survivors
of domestic violence seeking protection orders, either civil or
criminal, from their abusive partners.
Other statutes have historically prevented or otherwise
seriously hindered lesbian and gay survivors of domestic violence
from seeking help from legal authorities. Traditionally the United
States federal government refused to recognize lesbians and ga